


Adventures Through Parenthood

by KyHasNoLife



Series: Maya and Carina Fics [33]
Category: Grey's Anatomy, Station 19 (TV)
Genre: :), F/F, Fluff, Kid Fic, Original Character(s), a little angst eventually, but not until later chapters
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-26
Updated: 2021-02-02
Packaged: 2021-03-04 00:28:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 16
Words: 28,455
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24564619
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KyHasNoLife/pseuds/KyHasNoLife
Summary: Maya and Carina explore parenthood.
Relationships: Maya Bishop/Carina DeLuca
Series: Maya and Carina Fics [33]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1715209
Comments: 137
Kudos: 445





	1. They were parents

**Author's Note:**

> I felt like someone needed to make them a kid fic. So here we are.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "She found Maya by the nursery, her eyes trained on a little baby by the back of the room."
> 
> AKA chapter 1 of a kid fic I decided to write :)

**July 18th, 2022**

_ “What do you think about kids?” _

_ “What?” _

_ “We have talked about our future, our life, but we have never discussed kids. I am just wondering where you stand on kids.” _

_ “Uhm, I don’t know.” _

_ “You don’t know? Carina that’s not an answer!” _

_ “I- I never have really wanted kids until we got together, so now I don’t know.” _

_ “So you want them?” _

_ “I don’t know, Maya! Do you?” _

_ “Kind of. I know I work a lot, but I want to have a bigger legacy than a firefighter captain Olympian.” _

_ “We- we work insane hours, Maya, do you really think we could have kids?” _

_ “Yeah. Yeah I think we could.” _

* * *

**January 29th, 2024**

Here they were, a year and a half later. Married, licensed to adopt, but no kids. Each time they started to go to the adoption process the family changed their mind or decided on a different couple. Within the last 3 months they had 5 deals fall through. They had stopped getting their hopes up when the agency called them.

One Sunday, both Maya and Carina were working when Carina’s phone rang. When she saw it was someone from the adoption agency, she sighed sadly and answered it.

She couldn’t help but get a little hopeful when she heard there was a mom who had chosen Carina and Maya to take her baby.

She clicked on Maya’s contact, she almost clicked call, but she didn’t want to pull the blonde away from work. Especially since it would probably fall through again.

Carina went to the mom’s room (it was easy for her to find since she was head of OB), and quickly introduced herself to the young, pregnant woman named Lara.

“You're the doctor I’m giving my baby to?”

“Yeah, I- my wife and I are really happy you picked us.”

“Well, you’re a doctor, she’s a firefighter, my baby will be surrounded by good people,” Lara smiled at her, her blue eyes reminded Carina of Maya’s. Maybe the baby would have them.

Carina smiled back before walking out of the room, grabbing her phone, and calling Maya. Lara felt sure. Of course the other one’s did too, but Maya should be here.

“Hi?”

“Ciao, bella.”

“I am working right now, is everything okay?”

“Si, there is a 21 year old woman at the hospital giving birth. She wants to give her baby to us.”

“That’s not how that works- some random patient can’t just give us her baby,” Maya laughed confused.

“No! No, it is through the adoption agency. She decided last minute we were the family she wanted, I guess.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah.”

“I- I will be there in a few minutes. J- wow.”

“Yeah, I will see you soon?”

“You will, I- we are gonna be parents, Car!”

“Yeah, yeah, we are,” Carina smiled as if it just hit her.

“I love you, I’ll see you in five minutes.”

After hanging up, Carina walked back into the room. “So uhm, how far apart are your contractions?”

“8 minutes.”

“Cool, cool. So why are you giving the baby up?”

“Her, it’s a girl, and I’m still in school. I have stuff I want to do. I’m just not ready for a kid yet. How long have you and your wife wanted kids?”

“I didn’t even want kids until I met Maya. I never wanted to settle down, or anything like that, but she changed me for the better. Do you- uhm, we don’t have a name picked out for the baby- for her- yet. Do you- do you have a name for her?”

“Uhm, yeah, yeah, Alex. It was her dad’s name. He passed away 2 months ago. We were thinking about giving her up anyways, b-but without him I can’t raise a baby.”

“Oh. I am so sorry for your loss.”

“I-it’s fine reall- AHHH CONTRACTION!” The young girl yelled and Carina instantly went to grab her hand. She might not know the girl well, but it was gonna be the biological mother of her child.

When Maya got there, Carina instantly pulled her aside and told her what she knew.

“She does not want a baby without her partner who passed away recently, so she is putting her up for adoption.” Maya nodded and they discussed a little more before going into the room.

An hour or two later, there was a loud wailing right after Lara had yelled loudly and gave Carina’s hand a final squeeze. Carina and Maya both instantly felt drawn towards the tiny, crying figure.

The Italian watched as her wife’s eyes went wide when the OB gave her the scissors to cut the cord.

“Bella, do it,” Carina urged quietly, and Maya nodded before doing it.

“C-can I see her? Then I want you guys to take her away. If she wants to know me she can I guess, but I don’t know how well I want to know her,” Lara admitted. The doctor nodded before placing the small baby in her arms.

“She has my eyes. Her dad’s hair, tan skin. My dad’s nose though,” Lara smiled at the baby before handing her to Carina.

“Thank you so much,” Carina whispered quietly before getting entranced in the tiny human in her arms.

The doctor’s took her and Carina looked at Lara with a small smile, “Alex Maria Bishop-DeLuca.”

“What?”

“That’s what Maya and I decided to name her. Alex for you and your late loved one, and Maria after my grandma, but she will go by Mia.”

“Going by a nickname for her middle name?” The blue eyed girl laughed and Carina nodded with a kind smile.

She found Maya by the nursery, her eyes trained on a little baby by the back of the room.

“We have a bambina,” Carina whispered as she wrapped her arms around Maya’s waist to hug the girl from behind, her eyes focusing on the same baby.

“I- I know, Lara just gave birth, but has she- has she finished the adoption paperwork? Do you know? Because I wanna- I want to make sure she’s ours.”

“I don’t think Lara is done, but Maria is ours Maya. She’s our passerotta.”

“What does that mean?” Maya asked as she turned in the doctor’s arms.

“Little sparrow. I-if you don’t like it we can switch to another nickname. O-one in English if you-”

“I love it, Car.”

They smiled stupidly at each other for a moment before Maya got a call from work.

“I- I am needed at the station. I’m sorry. Call me if there is any change?” Maya said as she hesitantly tore herself away from the brunette’s embrace

“You can go, Maya, we agreed I would take maternity leave first. If you have to work, it is okay.”

An hour later, it was official. They were parents. Legally.

Carina was in the nursery, holding the little baby. She had little fluffs of brown hair, and her eyes looked to be brown, but Carina knew the large eyes would change colours for the next 6 months.

“Hi, Piccola. Wow, you are so tiny,” Carina talked quietly as she rocked the small baby in her arms.

“Your momma and I are really excited to have you,” Carina said as she continued to hold and rock and coo at the baby for another 20 minutes before going to talk to Bailey about her leave.

It didn’t hit her until she had officially been put on maternity leave. She was now a mom. Holy shit that was weird.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The name Lara was recommended by @classykarev on twitter  
> The name Alex was recommended by @station19marina on twitter  
> The name Mia was recommended by @LarissaMZaura on twitter  
> Thanks to everyone who left name suggestions!


	2. Attention Seeker

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Mia reached up and tried to grab on and wrap her arms around Maya’s neck but her short little arms made it hard and she just grabbed Maya's shirt, the baby yawned and leaned against Maya’s body."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Usually I won’t post a new chapter two days in a row, but I wanted to get some new marina content out, I didn’t feel like writing something new, and I already had this chapter written.  
> Hope you enjoy it :)

**A/N: While writing this chapter, I realized I have no idea how one take cares of a newborn, so this might not be the best depiction of this but I did google and try to learn stuff (and now I get baby ads on YouTube)**

Carina managed to cheat with maternity leave; the baby would be in the hospital for the first 48 hours of her life anyways, so Carina decided to not start it until the 31st when they were taking the brand new baby home.

Maya had the day off of work, so here they were, getting the baby ready to take her home.

Carina watched as Maya picked up and rocked the small girl in her arms. Very quickly, Carina had realized Maya had no idea how to hold a baby or take care of one, so when Maya’s shift had finished the day before that’s the first thing Carina taught her to do. Now, Maya was basically a pro at holding and carrying the baby, and Carina couldn’t help, but smile.

“The car is ready when you are,” The doctor smiled and shocked the blonde who jumped a little bit before turning around.

“Hi,” Maya smiled after catching her breath.

“Hi bambina,” Carina smiled as she walked in and placed a quick kiss on the baby’s forehead before pressing her lips to Maya’s.

“Is your brother working today?” Maya asked as Carina took the baby from her arms. Carina hummed and nodded, but she couldn’t take her eyes off the very, VERY tiny human in her arms. She rocked the baby slowly and Maya smiled widely at the view of her wife and their daughter together.

“What if we call him and have him take a picture before we leave?” Maya asked hesitantly. Carina looked shocked at her wife’s question, but nodded slowly. She knew Maya _hated_ pictures, but obviously the blonde didn’t want to forget this moment.

After many pictures had been taken, the family got in their car and went home. Carina brought the small girl to the yellow nursery they had decorated months earlier and put her down in the crib slowly. The baby just slept and the doctor just watched, her eyes drawn to the little girl. Her and Maya’s little girl; their bambina.

She set up the baby monitor before walking back into the kitchen to see Maya making them some lunch.

“Mia is asleep,” Carina hummed before pressing a quick kiss to Maya’s cheek.

“We have a baby,” Maya smiled stupidly at the doctor who returned the same smile.

“We do.”

“I love you,” Maya said as she pulled herself away from the soup she was making and put her hands on Carina’s waist pulling the taller woman’s body against her own.

“I love you too,” Carina smiled as she draped her arms around the blonde’s neck and pecked her lips quickly.

Carina pulled away, but it was all too soon in Maya’s opinion and the blonde reconnected their lips rather quickly.

The doctor started to push Maya back against the counter and quickly pulled away when she heard an “ouch, shit!”

“Note to self, don’t make out with your wife when you have a burner on,” Maya sighed as she started to wash the burn.

“I’m sorry,” Carina winced.

Maya quickly dealt with the burn on her left hand before grabbing one of Carina’s with her right, “Maybe, we take a pause on lunch,” The burner was now off and the pot of soup on the stove quickly bubbled down, “and go celebrate our newfound parenthood in the bedroom.”

“Mm, I like the way you think,” Carina smirked as she let Maya pull her to their bedroom.

Carina had just pressed Maya up against the door to their room when they heard wailing from the room next to theirs.

“She’s awake,” Carina sighed as she pulled away from her wife who smiled happily before exiting the room. Carina followed her and watched as her wife struggled to figure out what the baby wanted.

“I don’t think she’s hungry, in the hospital the hungry cry was different,” Maya looked panicked as she started to search around for any and everything wrong with the baby.

Carina chuckled and walked over to pick the crying baby up, she started to make silly faces at the baby who almost instantly calmed down. “She just wants our attention,” Carina cooed at the baby as she stuck her tongue out and did cross eyes. The baby laughed at her before reaching up and grabbing her cheeks. Carina puffed air in them for the baby to play with, which _apparently_ was incredibly entertaining to her.

“Show off,” Maya mumbled as she watched her wife and baby make faces at each other.

“No, just baby whisperer,” Carina stopped making faces at the little girl to stick her tongue out at her wife who laughed when Mia tried to grab her wife’s tongue.

“So, maybe don’t stick your tongue out, the baby will want it,” Maya chuckled and Carina made a scrunched up face at her.

“Do you want my tongue too?”

“Always,” Maya giggled as she leaned closer and kissed Carina softly. She felt Carina’s tongue on her bottom lip and she was gonna open her mouth and let the tongue in but she felt a tiny hand reach and try to grab her face, she pulled away and almost giggled at their daughter as she pouted, obviously still wanting their attention.

“We have quite the attention seeker,” Maya giggled as she looked down at the baby who started to play with Carina’s rings.

“Would you like to hold her?” Carina asked with a smile and Maya nodded before taking the small girl into her arms.

Mia reached up and tried to grab on and wrap her arms around Maya’s neck but her short little arms made it hard and she just grabbed Maya's shirt, the baby yawned and leaned against Maya’s body.

“Ah, you see, Maya, you are boring so now she is going to sleep,” Carina teased and Maya rolled her eyes, “Shut up!”

Carina giggled quietly before getting silent with her wife as they just watched the baby- _their_ baby as she fell asleep. It was like they were intoxicated by the tiny human, amazed by her, neither one could take their eyes off of her.

“Do you want me to finish the soup?” Carina asked finally and Maya nodded silently, still intoxicated by the little girl.

“Okay, sleep well passerotta,” Carina smiled at the baby before pressing a quick kiss to the tiny forehead and then kissing Maya.

She was impressed with how well they got along with the tiny girl already, but she was glad it went well. She turned around to leave before she heard a quiet, “Wait.”

Carina turned around to look at her wife who had spoken and hummed in acknowledgement.

“How do you say that? Pass-her-oat-uh?” Maya tried to sound it out as she rocked the baby slowly and Carina had to try her best not to laugh loudly.

“Uhm, we will work on it, if you wanna call her an Italian nickname go with bambina for now,” Carina giggled before going to make them lunch.


	3. It's okay

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Carina needs sleep.

It was February 29th, 2024. Mia’s one month birthday. Which was awesome! It was! They had memorized all of her cries, and she had gotten used to their voices. She was awesome and cute and amazing, but Carina needed sleep. On nights Maya worked, she was lucky to get three hours of sleep. On nights she was home, Carina was lucky to get 5 hours. Maya wasn’t working today which was nice, except here Carina was at 5 am giving the baby a bottle. The little coos and grunts she was making were cute, but it was 5 am. Carina wouldn’t be able to get back to sleep. Mia, however, was able to go right back to sleep after getting a few ounces of formula.

Once she was 100% sure Mia was asleep, she went back to her and Maya’s room to see her wife sound asleep again. They had both popped up at the baby’s crying, but Maya had been the one to put her back to sleep an hour and a half earlier, so this time it was Carina’s turn. She laid back in the bed to feel Maya almost instantly turn and wrap around her. When Maya’s head landed on her shoulder she couldn’t help, but place a kiss against her wife’s head. She felt Maya hum contentedly into her neck and she couldn’t help the faint smile on her lips.

When Carina woke up after 4:30 am she couldn’t get back to sleep… ever. It was strange and annoying, but she turned on the lamp on her nightstand and used one hand to hold her book while the other wrapped around her sleeping wife and drew patterns on her back.

An hour and a half later, Mia started crying again, this cry was her dirty diaper cry. She watched as Maya started to get up and sighed, “I can do it, Maya.”

“No,” The blonde yawned, “It’s my turn.”

“I was already awake, you just go back to sleep, bella,” Carina tried and Maya, not wanting to argue (and wanting to sleep), just nodded before flopping back onto the bed.

After changing the baby’s diaper, she looked at the wide eyes (they had been looking dark blue recently), and knew Mia wouldn’t be going back to sleep, so she grabbed the small baby and started walking to the kitchen to make some caffè. The little baby had gripped on tightly to her shirt and babbled something. 

While the coffee brewed, Carina sat on the couch tickling the seemingly happy baby who smiled and cooed. Carina hadn’t realized how difficult it would be to pour her coffee while holding the baby, so she just sighed and sat back on the couch, coffeeless.

She loved Mia. She did! Mia was her bambina! It was just she hadn’t really expected never being able to put her down. Mia was a relatively easy baby, but she loved attention and loved being held. It was impossible to put her down without her starting to cry unless you were right there tickling her. It was just making Carina’s life very hard, especially on days Maya worked.

When her wife worked and the baby needed a bottle, she listened to wailing as she made it, when she went to get a new diaper for her. Sometimes when Maya worked, she didn’t even eat so she didn’t have to put Mia down.

The other day, Andrew came over to hang out with her and Mia while Maya was at work. He was supposed to stay for an hour, but he stayed for five, made Carina some food, played with Mia so she could catch up on sleep, and just overall was an awesome brother. Of course, he had to wake her up to go home, and then Mia kept her up pretty much all night.

Carina would never say it allowed, but she was jealous of Maya. She loved their daughter, but she missed work and sleep. Every time she had the thought, she regretted it right away, what kind of parent was she? What kind of parent was she if she wished she was at work instead of with her one month old baby?

The Italian turned her attention backs to the small baby. Mia smiled happily at her and all the annoyance in her body just dissipated. She rocked Mia whose eyes got heavy again. Before she knew it, Mia was asleep, and she decided to lay back and rock the baby against her chest.

She didn’t even realize she had fallen asleep until a while later when wailing woke her up. She had to put the baby down to get her a bottle. The wailing got even louder and within 3 minutes, Maya walked out rubbing her eyes.

“What’s happening?” Maya asked loudly.

“The baby needs a bottle, and she won’t be quiet while I try to make it and-” Carina cut herself off with a whine.

“Okay, okay, shh, okay, I will make the bottle,” Maya came up behind Carina and hugged her before pressing a quick kiss to her cheek, “You go get the baby. Cari, I got the bottle.”

Carina nodded slowly and went to grab the crying baby from the couch, upon being picked up the baby quieted down and when Carina started bouncing her, she almost instantly stopped crying. “Hey, passerota, it’s okay, calm down, mommy is making you a bottle, j-just calm down.”

Mia all of the sudden was crying and after a second, Carina was crying with her. She was exhausted and hungry and she needed coffee, but the baby wouldn’t stop crying until she got her bottle. Maya finished heating up the bottle and rushed over and grabbed the baby from her crying wife’s arm.

As Maya fed the baby, she felt Carina lean on her shoulder as sobs lightly and quietly racked through her body.

“It’s okay, baby,” Maya whispered before kissing Carina’s head against her shoulder. As she ate, Mia’s eyes got heavy, and then she fell asleep quickly. “Okay, Carina, I need you to get off of my shoulder, so I can put her in the bassinet, but I’ll be right back, okay?”

Carina nodded and sniffed as she sat up and rubbed her eyes. Maya came back a minute later and sat down on the couch and instantly took Carina into her arms, they laid back and the doctor just cried quietly in the blonde’s arms.

After Carina was done crying, she was just lying with her head on Maya’s chest.

“What’s wrong, my love?”

“I just- I miss work, and I know that’s bad, but I miss it and she keeps me up all night when you’re gone a-and she cries all the time, she’s always crying and I- I-”

“Shhh, it’s okay, it’s okay,” Maya whispered soothingly as she rubbed the Italian’s back. 

“I’m sorry.”

“No, Carina, you don’t have to be sorry.”

“I just complained about our one month old, I feel like I have to be a little sorry,” Carina chuckled against her wife’s chest.

“It’s fine, Car, you’re sleep-deprived, it’s okay, but uhhh are you sure you don’t want me to start maternity leave now?”

Carina sat up and with her very, very sleep deprived eyes glared at her wife, “What do you mean, can’t you see that I am- uhm what is the word? Uhm thriving?”

“Oh yeah, you just had a breakdown at 8 am because of our 1 month old, you are definitely thriving.”

Carina laughed before pressing a quick kiss to her wife’s lips.

“Maybe we take advantage of the sleeping baby?” She mumbled with a smile against the blonde’s lips.

“Yeah, you should go to sleep,” Maya said as she pushed her wife off of her. She giggled at Carina’s pout.

“That’s not what I meant.”

“I know, trust me, I know, but you’re so exhausted that I don’t know if sex is the best idea,” Maya smirked and Carina scrunched up her face before sighing when she heard the baby crying on the monitor in the kitchen. 

“I-”

“I’ve got her. Go. To. Sleep.” Maya commanded Carina who opened her mouth to argue, but Maya spoke before she could, “Ah! This is not up for debate, and when the baby is keeping me up all night when I am on leave you can do this, but right now, I do not need a grumpy wife and grumpy baby. Sleep,” Maya demanded and pointed towards the bedroom.

Carina chuckled and pressed a kiss to her wife’s lips as she headed to their bedroom and Maya headed towards the baby’s room.

Maybe it would help her a little bit if she asked Maya for help more, although it’s not really like she had really asked for help this time, but this taught her that it was okay to ask Maya for help with their baby. It wasn’t like Mia was only hers, she just needed to accept she couldn’t do it alone.


	4. Followed Suit

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Carina's last day of maternity leave aka Maya's last of work.

April 24th, 2024. 

It was Carina’s last day of maternity leave. As she thought about it, that seemed crazy. In Italy, she would’ve gotten 12 weeks, minimum. In the US, she only gets 12. In Italy she could’ve taken 5 months off, if that's what she needed. It just seemed crazy to Carina that she would be leaving the not even 3 month old baby already. Okay, Mia was basically three months, but she wasn’t yet, and Carina had to return to work.

Carina had missed work though. Like a lot, but recently, Mia started sleeping for five hours at a time. Technically, sleeping through the night. She would go to bed at 10, wake up at 2 or 3, then go back to sleep until a reasonable time in the morning. With both her and Mia getting more sleep, the leave had been more enjoyable.

Recently, Mia’s eyes had been a pretty light blue and they had stayed that way for a while, but they still had a while until her eyes would stop changing colors.

Since Maya was gonna be on maternity leave, they were gonna go to the beach in a few weeks. Carina figured she could take 4 days off work using some PTO, and Maya wouldn’t have to take time off. No taking time off meant no stress about work.

Today though, Maya was finishing her final shift as Captain for 12 weeks as Carina was at home cooing at their baby.

Currently, Carina was holding the baby who was smiling happily at her. They had her three month check up soon, but Carina would be working during it. Luckily, she worked in the hospital, so she would try to dip out and make it to the appointment.

She had dressed Mia in a dinosaur shirt Maya had bought a few weeks ago tucked into green leggings that matched the dinosaur on the center of the shirt. She had looked awfully cute and Carina didn’t forget to remind the baby. They were currently on the couch, Mia had just finished her bottle and was smiling at her mom.

“How are you so carina- cute? How are you so cute, passerota?” Carina cooed at the baby. Mia was currently sitting in her lap, though unable to sit up on her own yet, so one of Carina’s hands was holding her up while the other was holding her coffee.

Mia made a babbling sound before reaching to grab some of the hair that had fallen out of Carina’s loose ponytail. She had developed a pretty strong grip recently, so Carina jerked her head away, not looking to have the baby tear her hair out. As soon as Carina looked at the baby again she saw her shoving her little hands into her mouth and smiling.

Carina chuckled as she put her coffee down and checked her watch, Maya should get home from her last official shift soon. The good thing about 24 hour shifts is Maya would get home in the morning, so after a nap they’d have the day ahead of them.

“How about-” Carina paused as she used both hands to lift the baby up before standing up herself, “We have some tummy time before a nap, si?” At the little coo of approval from Mia, Carina chuckled and said, “Si!” before putting the baby on the play mat, on her stomach. Carina checked something on her phone, she heard small grunts from the baby, but none seemed upset. When she looked back down at the baby, she saw Mia, lying on her back, staring at the doctor with a smile.

“Did you just roll over?” Carina asked with a small gasp as she started to tickle the baby’s toes. Mia just smiled wider and babbled some more.

Carina took a picture of the baby and sent it to Maya with the caption ‘look who just rolled over for the first time.’

Hell, 5 years ago, if asked Carina if she would ever have kids, she would’ve said no. Yet, here she is. WIth the love of her life, and a small baby of their own. She was beyond happy. 

Mia started to get a little fussy when Maya texted Carina back ‘Our little baby is getting so big! Also, I told you the shirt wasn’t only for boys! Thank you for listening, she looks so cute!’ was Maya’s response which earned an eye roll from Carina before she picked the baby up.

It was too early for a nap, her nap schedule was 9:30 to 11 am then she napped from 1-3 pm then one more nap from 6-7. It was 8:30 right now. Maya was usually home around 9, so she had a half hour to kill and nothing to do. She ended up putting Mia in her high chair (they had gotten it a week ago, suddenly aware how useful it would be), put her favorite toy in front of her (it was a butterfly rattle that Mia loved the sound of), and making some breakfast.

Right as she finished making breakfast, Maya got home. Instantly, the blonde walked up to her wife and hugged her from behind before pressing a chaste kiss to her neck.

“Ciao, amore,” Carina mumbled as she turned in Maya’s arms, so she could look at the blonde.

“Hi,” Maya mumbled as she started to move her lips closer to Carina’s. The Italian smirked and closed the distance between their lips. They hadn’t really had a lot of time together for a while because of- Mia, who had just started fussing in her high chair.

Maya pulled back to get the baby as Carina made them both a plate for breakfast.

“Hi, baby, I really needed to hold you after this shift,” Carina heard her wife whisper and looked to see her press a kiss to their baby’s head.

“What happened? Is everything okay?” Carina asked with a furrowed eyebrow. Maya didn’t look hurt, but what if she had missed it? What if she missed her wife being hurt? A doctor missing their wife being hurt would just be embarrassing.

“Yeah, just we had a hard fire. The family had a baby, and he’s  _ fine _ now, but the mom thought the dad was getting him out and the dad thought the mom would do it. It just- God, I can’t imagine if Mia was all alone in a burning building. The dad tried to fight me to get into the house, but- I actually got them to calm down saying I got it, if it was my daughter, I’d feel the same.”

Carina nodded slowly, put the plates of toast, eggs, and bacon for Maya, on the table before pressing a kiss to her wife’s forehead, “If Mia is ever stuck in a burning building alone, your team will get her. I think we should try to avoid that though,” Carina ended with a small smile and Maya just chuckled quietly before putting the baby back in her high chair and sitting down at the table.

“Thanks for breakfast,” Maya smiled as Carina sat down across from her.

“Other than the house with the baby, how was work?” Carina asked kindly.

Maya started to describe her day as they ate. When they were done eating, Maya went to put Mia down for a nap as Carina cleaned up.

When Mia fell asleep, Maya just sat and stared at her for a while. If it was her today, she wouldn’t want firefighters to tell her to leave her daughter alone. Although she was a firefighter, so maybe there was less of a risk if she went in. Carina was right though, in a fire, they wouldn’t forget the baby. Maya didn’t know how much time had passed as she just watched the baby’s chest rise and fall.

“Are you okay?” Carina whispered from the door, and Maya shrugged.

“I guess, today just shook me,” she sighed and Carina nodded.

“Okay, come here,” She held her hand out to the blonde who took it gratefully.

As soon as Carina had pulled Maya out of Mia’s room, she pushed her up against a near wall and started kissing her neck. Carina started to pull off the firefighter’s shirt, but Maya stopped her, “Maybe not right outside the baby’s room because if we wake her up we throw off the whole schedule.”

Carina nodded in agreement and grabbed Maya’s hand again to pull her into the bedroom.

An hour later, they were lying in bed together, clothes discarded throughout the room, Maya with her head on Carina’s chest as the brunette drew circles on her wife’s back.

“Mm, this was a good way to celebrate the end of your leave and the start of yours,” Maya whispered before turning her head so she could kiss her wife’s jaw.

“We haven’t er-  _ celebrated _ enough recently,” Carina smirked and Maya moved up to kiss her until she heard the baby crying,

“She’s up,” Maya sighed as she got out of the bed and started to get dressed.

“I can get her,” Carina said as she followed suit.

“No, it’s fine, I’m on leave now,” Maya smiled.


	5. The Beach

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “I hate you!” Maya yelled over her shoulder, the loud noise causing the baby to cry.
> 
> “You love me,” Carina smiled before putting her plate down on the coffee table next to Maya’s and taking the crying baby from her wife who instantly stopped crying when the Italian picked her up.

They were at the beach. Maya was at the beach for four days. She hadn’t been at work in a month. Originally, she expected it to be difficult, taking 12 weeks off of work for Mia, but after the first week when she had barely realized the time going by she knew that wasn’t true. It was their second day at the beach today, yesterday they got to the beach house around 2pm, unpacked the car, and then went to the beach for an hour and a half before going back to the house. Once they had gotten back, Carina got Mia down for a nap and Maya started making dinner.

That night, Maya had fallen asleep before Carina had gotten into bed, when she woke up the next morning, she felt her head on soft skin and her body wrapped around her wife’s.

Maya looked at the clock to see it was 7:15 am, and usually she would get up but Carina said it was too early to get up that early on vacation, so Maya just tried to burrow her head into Carina’s chest and go back to sleep. But Mia had different plans. As soon as Maya was almost asleep again, the four month old baby (as of 3 days ago) woke up.

Maya groaned as she got out of bed and quickly went to the baby in the pack and play (a crib-like thing that folds up and had been very useful this trip).

“Ciao, bambina,” Maya whispered as she picked up the baby and held her on her hip so she could quickly get out of the room and let Carina go back to sleep.

“Okay, passerota, we’re gonna let mama sleep in today okay?” Maya asked and Mia just looked at her, looking slightly in awe of the blonde.

“Okay, how about I put you down here, and I go make you a bottle,” Maya said as she put the baby sitting up on the couch. She started heating up the water when she heard crying, and rushed back over to the couch to see that Mia had flopped over her side and then fell onto her stomach.

“Well, that’s one way to get to your stomach on your own,” Maya said as she picked up the baby.

By the time Carina woke up, an hour later, Maya was lying on the couch with their daughter on her lap.

“Good morning, bambina,” Carina whispered as she pressed a kiss on Maya’s head, “and you too, passerota,” the Italian said as she grabbed the baby from the firefighter’s lap and kissed Mia’s nose quickly before sitting down next to Maya’s feet on the couch.

“When do you want to go to the beach, today?” Maya asked as she sat up and smiled at her wife making silly faces at their smiling baby.

“Mm, after I have some caffe, please,” Carina said as she looked over at her wife. She didn’t mean to get lost in the light blue eyes, yet here she was, her eyes stuck on her wife’s. Until the baby grabbed her hair and pulled it.

“Ah! Merda!” Carina groaned as she tried to get her hair out of Mia’s grip. Maya giggled before leaning forward and helping get Carina’s hair out of the blue-eyed baby’s hand.

“Dio, I love you,” Carina said with a sigh of relief before handing the baby to Maya and going to get herself a cup of coffee.

“Can you get me one too- oh and a bagel with cream cheese?” Maya asked her wife with a grin before turning her attention back to Mia who started to play with the wedding ring on Maya’s ring finger.

“Sì, I still don’t understand how one eats before noon,” Carina said shaking her head looking semi disappointed.

“Sorry we didn’t all grow up in Italy and have nothing or barely anything for breakfast,” Maya shrugged before turning her attention back to Mia.

Within the next hour, they had finished breakfast and gotten ready for the beach.

“Cari, c’mon, let’s go!” Maya groaned. Carina had been taking pictures of Mia in her swimsuit for like 10 minutes now.

“One more! You two in your swimsuits together!”

“But why!?”

“Your mama asked me for lots of pictures of the baby and I figured maybe she’ll want some of you as well,” Carina explained and Maya opened her mouth to protest but was suddenly scared of her wife’s demanding glare.

After Carina got one of Maya and Mia, the blonde  _ required _ her wife set a timer on the camera to get a photo of all three of them together. The baby in her lime polka dot bikini and a white sun hat being held by Maya who was wearing a light blue swimsuit that she had gotten specifically to go with Carina’s plain pastel yellow bikini, which if you asked Maya was far too revealing.

“Bella, you’re staring,” Carina said as soon as the picture had been taken and she was going to get the camera.

“W- huh?” Maya said, looking up to meet brown eyes.

“You’re staring at my throat, and my boobs, and my collarbone, and my stomach, and my-”

“Okay! Yes, I’m staring, but the bikini- it’s sexy, but  _ really _ revealing,” Maya pointed out as she checked her wife out Carina rolled her eyes and looked at the pictures they got, “Maya, no jealousy around the baby!”

“I’m not jealous! It’s just- well- what if some random man tries to hit on you! You look so-  _ so _ good and-”

“Maya, it’s fine,” Carina laughed as she put her coverup back on before whirling around to look at her wife and her baby, “But, maybe, I have to kiss you once every 15 minutes at the beach so no one gets the wrong idea.”

Maya giggled and smirked at Carina’s comment, she felt soft, familiar lips quickly peck her own before the baby was lifted from her arms and cooed at Carina with an adorable little grin.

“Ahhjah,” The baby cooed as she grabbed at Carina’s face.

Maya put a t-shirt on and grabbed their bag for the beach. Even Carina’s cover up was too revealing for Maya not to feel a little over protective. Her wife’s body was amazing, but she knew every inch and curve of Carina’s body, and she didn’t like the idea of something so personal for her.

“Maya, I love you, but this is what I’m wearing, and if a man checks me out, you can just kiss me,” Carina offered to Maya who scrunched her face.

While at the beach, it was Maya who got asked out by some random man.

_ “Can I get your number?” A random maybe 30 year old man asked the blonde while she was lying on the beach next to her wife and baby. Mia had decided to take a beach nap on Carina’s chest and it was beyond adorable. _

_ “What?” She asked with an amused scoff, she assumed lying with Carina would make the baby would make it obvious enough they were together. She glanced over to see one of Carina’s eyes open as she delivered a deathly glare at the man. _

_ “Well, I’m assuming your friend will want some time alone with her baby this trip, so maybe you can join me for a night, give the baby and her ma some time together.” _

_ “Cari, he’s right, Mia and I should have some alone time tonight. We didn't pack enough formula anyways, can you get her more formula so me and her can spend some time together, baby?” _

_ “Of course, amore, I’m always for you and our daughter bonding,” Carina smiled before reaching for Maya’s hand with her free hand and pulling it to her lips. _

_ “Uhh, right of course,” The man said nervously before turning away. _

_ “And you thought I’d be the one they hit on,” Carina smirked at her wife who moved to kiss the brunette. _

When they got back to the beach house, not long after, Maya was on the couch, feeding Mia as Carina made them lunch.

“Baby! Mia- no!” Maya laughed as she repositioned the baby.

“What’d she try to do this time?”

“She tried to nurse again, but I don’t have the proper boobs for that,” Maya said as she put the bottle back into the baby’s mouth.

“No, you do not,” Carina mumbled as she walked over to her wife before placing a plate with a turkey sandwich next to Maya. She then turned to address the baby, “These boobs are for me not you.”

“Carina!” Maya squealed as she turned bright red.

“What?”

“You can’t- you can’t tell the baby about-”

“She won’t remember it in two hours,” Carina pointed out as she pressed a kiss to Maya’s cheek before going to get her own sandwich.

“I hate you!” Maya yelled over her shoulder, the loud noise causing the baby to cry.

“You love me,” Carina smiled before putting her plate down on the coffee table next to Maya’s and taking the crying baby from her wife who instantly stopped crying when the Italian picked her up.

“That’s unfair!” Maya complained, and Carina just winked at her.


	6. Bets

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “If I’m right, you should bring Mia by the station once a week for lunch or dinner."
> 
> “Deal, we already go once a month anyways. If I’m right, and I am, you have to arrange a date for us. You get our passerota a sitter, choose what we’re doing, I am not involved at all unless it’s giving you my work schedule."
> 
> “Deal.”

“7 months,” Maya mumbled as she watched the baby sleep.

“What?” Carina asked quietly from her spot on her wife’s shoulder.

Currently, they were in the nursery, Maya was standing over the crib, looking at Mia who had just fallen asleep for, hopefully, the night. Carina had walked in a few moments earlier and hugged the blonde from behind, resting her head on the pale shoulder.

“Tomorrow, our bambina is 7 months,” Maya whispered happily.

“Si, it feels like we got her yesterday,” Carina responded as she pressed a kiss to Maya’s shoulder. The Italian had to say, she was incredibly happy about her wife’s outfit choice, the thin tank top showed off Maya’s muscles and Carina loved it.

“It does,” Maya whispered as she turned in Carina’s arms and pressed kissed Carina.

“Bedroom?” The taller girl asked into the kiss.

Maya just nodded, grabbing the doctor’s hand and walking them to the bedroom.

“She got up on all fours the other day,” Maya told Carina when they made it into their room.

“Mhm, lo so,” The brunette mumbled as she started to undress herself.

“I think she’ll be crawling by the time she’s 9 months.”

“I disagree, I think by the time she’s 8 months,” Carina said and started to undress the blonde.

“If I’m right, you should bring Mia by the station once a week for lunch or dinner,” Maya smirked and picked Carina up to press her against the door to their room.

“Deal, we already go once a month anyways. If I’m right, and I am,  _ you _ have to arrange a date for us. You get our passerota a sitter, choose what we’re doing, I am not involved at all unless it’s giving you my work schedule,” Carina said before moaning quietly from the spot Maya definitely just left a hickey, she would worry about that in the morning. They had gone on a date a few months ago, but Carina had to plan everything which she ended up getting upset with Maya about.

“Deal.”

The next morning, Maya woke up to go to her run to find her wife nowhere in sight. The blonde scrunched her face and put on her running clothes before checking the nursery. Still no Carina- and also no Mia? Where were they?

Maya’s question was answered seconds later when she found Carina lying on the couch, barely awake, trying to entertain the baby who decided it was time to start her day.

“Good morning, baby,” Maya said as she grabbed the baby from her half asleep wife’s arms and pressed a kiss to the tiny human’s forehead. Mia reached out and grabbed Maya’s cheeks, the blonde blew air in them which thoroughly entertained Mia for a few moments when Maya quickly added, “Good morning to you too, my love.” The blonde looked down to see Carina had already made her way back asleep.

“Guess we’re gonna need the jogging stroller huh?” Maya asked Mia who just smiled at her before letting out a little giggle. The blonde left a note for her wife before putting the baby in the jogging stroller and getting ready to go.

The alarm on Carina’s phone woke her up a little bit later. She had an hour to get ready for work and- where was the baby? Last thing the brunette remembered was playing with the baby. She must’ve fallen back asleep (something that having a baby had made her really good at) with the baby in her lap. Carina looked around the floor frantically, trying to find Mia. She let out a sob of relief when she saw a note from Maya on the coffee table.

_ Good morning my love, _

_ As I’m sure you’ve noticed our fetus has disappeared. Don’t worry, she’s with me, we went on a nice little jog. I love you, you’re awesome, I’ll probably see you soon because we both work today and the hospital has that nice free daycare that the station does not. _

_ Ti amo, _

_ Maya Bishop-DeLuca (aka the love of your life [aka the best thing that’s ever happened to you {aka your wife}]) _

_ P.S. I know Mia is no longer a fetus but she’s still very tiny, therefore to me she is still a fetus. _

Carina rolled her eyes at the note before making some coffee and starting to get ready for work.

Carina was gonna leave for work at 6:50 for her 7am rounds, but Maya didn’t have to leave until right before 8, so Mia would be in daycare all day until Carina picked her up and brought her home for a Mia and Carina night since Maya worked a 24 hour shift. The next morningCarina would bring Mia to the daycare around 7 and right after Maya’s shift, at about 8, she would pick up Mia from the hospital daycare so that the baby wouldn’t have to spend two full days in a row at the daycare. It was a new system they had started a few weeks ago, but they both liked the fact that Mia wasn’t always at daycare anymore.

After she and Mia had gotten back from the hospital, she dressed Mia up in a cute little outfit before 

A week later, Carina’s shift was particularly tough, she FaceTimed Maya to complain as she made dinner and let Mia play on her little playmat.

“It was just so- I hate losing patients. She was 25, how was she supposed to know not only did her family has history of ovarian cancer and that it would get worse during her pregnancy? A man lost his wife and baby today because of a cancer she couldn’t have known of.”

“Well, couldn’t she have known though?”

“No, no, she was adopted, she had no clue,” Carina explained solemnly.

“Should we- uh- should we get Mia tested for anything like that?”

“Cosa?”

“Well, we don’t know her family history, what if something like that happens to her,” Maya shrugged over the facetime screen.

“I- yeah-” Carina mumbled as she turned around to look at the baby on the floor, “Oh my- bella, you owe me a date!” Carina exclaimed as she picked up her phone and brought it to where the baby was, so she could show Maya their little girl crawling around.

“Dang it, passerota!” Maya exclaimed, “I’m terrible at planning these things! She is  _ not _ on my side here!”

“Eh, she loves you, she just loves me more,” Carina shrugged before placing her phone down so Maya could still see her, picking the baby up, and pressing a kiss to a kiss to a pale cheek.

“How did she even get to crawling so fast?” Maya asked with a fake annoyed tone. In reality she was happy about the baby crawling, even if it worked against her.

“She is an overachiever,” Carina informed as the baby took one of the fingers from Carina’s free hand and started to suck on it.

“Okay, well, she looks a little hungry, what’s for dinner tonight?”

“Uhm, I think we still have green beans and carrots, I’m not sure which she’ll be having,” Carina answered.

“Carrots, all the way!” Maya answered as if it was the obvious answer.

“Okay, I’m gonna feed her then finish making my dinner, tomorrow morning on her way to pick her up from the hospital will you grab some more baby food?” Carina asked as she started to heat up the carrots mixed with some of the rice cereal.

“Yeah, of course,” Maya answered happily.

“Okay, thank you, I love you, bye.”

“I love you too, bye,” Maya sighed from the other side of the phone before hanging up.

The next week, Maya’s mom babysat for the night while the couple went to dinner at a small Czech restaurant about a half hour away from their house. Maya decided on Czech because it’s one of the few cuisines she doesn’t think Carina had tried yet. They then had the whole night to themselves and in the early hours of the morning, right before they went to sleep, Carina whispered, “We should make bets more often.”

Little did they know, they would end up making  _ a lot _ of bets in the next few months.


	7. Celebrate

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Ah-ah!” was the noise that came out of the baby’s mouth.
> 
> “You hear that Maya? Passerota is getting ready to call me mama,” Carina teased as she poured herself some coffee.
> 
> “She’ll say mami first, won’t ya passerota?” Maya asked the baby who just looked at her confused before smiling happily.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Good morning, I do not know if this is good okay goodnight.

Carina sighed sadly as she walked into the door of her and Maya’s house. It was currently almost 11pm and she was just now getting home from a rough shift. However, Maya and Mia were all she had to worry about right now. She walked into the nursery to kiss Mia’s forehead before going to take her shower, but the baby wasn’t there, instead of panicking, she walked into her and Maya’s room where she found her wife, asleep on the bed with a baby sprawled out across her chest. Whenever Carina worked night shifts or was home late, Maya usually slept with their baby so the bed didn’t feel so big and lonely. Sometimes when Maya worked, Carina did it too.

She pressed a quick kiss to the baby’s head before pressing one to her wife’s as well and going to take her shower. When she finished her shower, she reentered her and Maya’s room to see Mia had rolled off Maya and was currently spread out and taking up a good portion of the king-sized bed. Carina quickly laid pillows out so the baby wouldn’t roll off the bed before getting changed and going to get herself some dinner, suddenly remembering she hadn’t eaten since breakfast that morning. By the time she’d finished eating, brushed her teeth, washed her face, and was ready for bed, it was nearly midnight.

Almost as soon as her head hit the pillow, her eyes were closed and she drifted asleep. She felt like she had been asleep for .2 seconds when she heard a wailing next to her. She checked the clock, 1:28. Mia hadn’t even really needed nighttime feedings anymore, right now, however, the nine month old needed a new diaper. And somehow, Maya was sleeping through the unhappy baby crying like a pterodactyl.

Within 5ish minutes, the baby was relaxed again, and Carina contemplated moving Mia to the nursery, but almost instantly after Carina picked her up, Mia fell asleep as her head was pushing into the dip between Carina’s shoulder and neck and the doctor hadn’t really felt like letting go of the baby, especially after the work day she’d had.

Carina then, laid back down, grabbed Maya’s hand and fell asleep, with the baby sprawled out across her chest.

Maya woke up to a warm, familiar palm on her own. She slowly opened her eyes to see Mia and Carina, asleep next to her. She felt bad for not even hearing Carina come in last night, Maya had had a long day with the baby who seemed interested in crawling all around and getting dirty all day. In the month since the baby had started crawling, she’d gotten super good and really fast, she’d been, as Andrew had said, “zooming all over the place.”

Eventually, the baby woke up while Carina was still asleep, so Maya and the baby went into the living room where Maya did paperwork and the baby played on the floor. The living room was the only area they’d child proofed, so it was penned in using a cheap wire fence they bought, so Mia couldn’t get out.

When Carina woke up, she checked the time and saw it was almost 10am, so she reluctantly got up to go get herself some coffee. She found Maya on the couch, playing on her phone, as Mia crawled around on the floor. When Mia saw Carina, her big blue eyes went wide and she smiled widely.

“Ah-ah!” was the noise that came out of the baby’s mouth.

“You hear that Maya? Passerota is getting ready to call me mama,” Carina teased as she poured herself some coffee.

“She’ll say mami first, won’t ya passerota?” Maya asked the baby who just looked at her confused before smiling happily.

“Mm, if she does, I’ll let you buy a running dog, but only if she’s a girl named Jeff.”

“Okay,” Maya chuckled confused, “If she says ‘mama’ first, which she won’t, but if she does, I’ll have my mom come stay with her for a weekend whilst you and I go on a little getaway.”

“I like the sound of that,” Carina smirked before sitting down on the floor, her coffee sitting next to her as she played with the baby. Mia was trying to crawl into Carina’s lap when she knocked the hot coffee over onto the floor and Carina’s leg.

“Merda,” Carina swore before handing Maya the baby, who just cooed and smiled at the blonde.

“That’s so unfair, Carina hissed as she went to get towels to clean up the wasted coffee on the floor and her thigh.

“Note to self, don’t let your wife wear sleep shorts and put her coffee near herself on the floor at the same time,” Maya joked as she held the baby.

“Maya, that’s not fair. It hurts,” Carina pouted at her wife’s joke.

“Okay, I’m sorry, take the baby and I’ll clean up.”

Carina happily took the baby and sat on the couch, to watch Maya clean. 

Carina made faces at the baby who smiled, and grabbed Carina’s hands. The baby grabbed one of Carina’s fingers and stuck it in her little mouth.

“Babies and their instincts to shove things in their mouths,” Maya rolled her eyes and looked at Carina who just stared at the baby with her jaw dropped. “Baby, what’s wrong?” Maya asked, getting nervous at her wife’s face.

“Maya feel this,” Carina said as she pulled her, now slobbery finger, out of the baby's mouth. Maya walked over and put her finger into the baby’s mouth and she felt little ridges- “Holy crap is that a tooth?”

“Yeah! Yeah, it is!”

“Wow, baby!” Maya exclaimed as she took the baby from Carina and smiled at her. All of the sudden leaving Carina to clean up the spilled coffee.

“We hadn’t even made bets about teeth!” Maya groaned randomly a few hours later after they’d cleaned up and Mia was napping.

“Mamma mia, you’re right! Okay, I bet you a month before her next tooth pops out!”

“I think 2 months! If I’m right then you have to take all the dirty diapers for a week..:

“Er, okay, if I’m right you have to go vegan for a week.”

“Deal. oh! Also, we should let her sleep in our bed again tonight, to celebrate her new tooth!” Maya said happily, really Carina knew it was because Maya wanted to cuddle with the baby, but she didn’t dare ruin her wife’s fun.

“ _ Or, _ me and you can celebrate while she sleeps in her own big girl room,” Carina smirked and Maya bit her lip before nodding in agreement.


	8. Lactose Intolerant

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The last few weeks or so hadn’t been great for them. With a million little fights about nothing turning into yelling matches, usually over the phone on their ways too and from work. Usually they tried to keep the arguments anywhere Mia wasn’t

Maya heard soft snores and looked down to see Mia  _ finally _ sleeping. She pressed a soft kiss to the tiny brunette’s head as she sighed. The little baby had recently decided, she would no longer sleep during the day, only at night. According to Carina, 10 month old babies should still be sleeping for about 12-16 hours throughout a 24-hour cycle. At this point, they were lucky to get Mia 9 hours of sleep in the 24 hours. The baby would sleep mostly through the night, but she just would not nap during the day. A few seconds after she noticed the baby, Carina walking back from the kitchen, a warm bottle of milk in her hands. Despite being covered in spit-up, something they’d seen less of recently until today, Carina looked great.

“The gremlin’s asleep,” Maya smiled as she watched her wife sit down with a grateful, tired, breath. The baby had started to drink less formula and more actual milk starting a few weeks ago, and she had loved it. However, now she was spitting up more and refusing to sleep.

“Maya Bishop-DeLuca, you did not just call our baby a gremlin!” Carina scolded as she put the bottle down on the coffee table and sat next Maya.

“Do we think she’s lactose intolerant?” Maya asked as she pressed a kiss to the baby’s head. Carina had to admit, Mia with her little chubby cheek pressed against Maya’s chest and her little body pressed between Maya’s and the couch was just adorable. To be fair though, Mia was just adorable.

“Maybe, but she had dairy formula, it only started when we started to take her off of formula, maybe she’s just being fussy while adjusting to the change,” Carina shrugged.

“Yeah, but maybe it’s just formed and we should maybe give her another few days on it and if she doesn’t get better take her to the doctor.”

“I’m right here, amore,” Carina teased.

Maya rolled her eyes at her wife before shaking her head, “A pediatrician.”

“Look, in a few weeks if our bambina is still acting like this, we could try soy or almond milk. Lactose intolerance can start at any time.”

“You just said it probably wasn’t lactose intolerance!”

“I said it maybe wasn’t!” Carina’s loud response caused the baby to pop up, her dark blue eyes wide open.

“You’ve got to be kidding,” Maya groaned at the baby who smiled at her. Her two bottom teeth visible in her mischievous grin. Carina had been closer for when the second tooth started coming in, so Maya had been vegan for one long week.

“Sorry, let me see her-” Carina went to grab the baby, but was just shook off by her wife.

“Don’t you have to get ready for work?” Maya asked, a hint of harshness in her voice that didn’t go unnoticed by Carina.

“Not yet, no,” Carina swallowed audibly before continuing, “Why? Are you trying to get rid of me?” Her question came off with an awkward chuckle. Not completely a rhetorical question despite her wishing it was just a joke.

“Nope, just wondering,” The blonde answered shortly.

Carina could tell that there was some anger in Maya’s voice and she took a deep breath, “Maya, what’s wrong you’re scaring me?”

The last few weeks or so hadn’t been great for them. With a million little fights about nothing turning into yelling matches, usually over the phone on their ways too and from work. Usually they tried to keep the arguments anywhere Mia wasn’t. Although their new lactose intolerant argument hadn’t been able to do that. They had been fine until a split second later when the baby was waking up.

There were a hundred things the blonde’s harsh tone could’ve been used for, but the most recent one that Carina could think of was divorce. She knew she knew she didn’t want a divorce, but if Maya wanted one, she would say yes to keep the blonde happy.

“Nothing, you have a shift soon, I have got the baby. You can trust me with her if nothing else,” Maya snapped.

Now, it made sense. The whole time, all the fighting the last few weeks had been about one thing- one small detail she had forgotten to mention to Maya. The small detail that Vincenzo DeLuca would be coming into town. She hadn’t exactly forgotten, she just hadn’t wanted her dad to meet Mia, so she didn’t tell Maya and she hoped that she could plan the trip so that Maya didn’t know about it. And so her dad never stepped foot into their house. Unfortunately for her, stupid Andrea hadn’t gotten the message, and one night she came home to her wife looking confused as her dad held the baby.

Carina had kept telling herself the arguments these last weeks had been on whatever irrelevant thing they had been arguing about, but she knew that wasn’t true, and that she should stop. However, she didn’t, she just sighed and whispered a quiet, “I do trust you, Maya.”

“Let’s talk about this later, okay?!” Maya snapped, her loud words making the baby who had just been sitting in her arms flinch and start to cry.

“Fine, I’ll see you tonight,” Carina answered, her tone quieter, sadder, as she walked into her and Maya’s bedroom to get ready for her shift that she most definitely didn’t want to go to.

Her shift had been long and boring and lonely. She had a bad feeling about getting home after her shift, and she just wanted to get home and hold her baby. She was oncall that night though, so she’d have to wait until morning. Which was fine and manageable usually, but when she FaceTimed Maya to say goodnight, the blonde didn’t answer. Usually Maya did answer and just let Carina say goodnight to Mia before quickly hanging up, but Carina didn’t even get an answer this time and she wanted to throw up.

The next morning, after a night of terrible sleep and almost no patients to keep her mind occupied, she got home at around 7 am. Maya’s car wasn’t there which wasn’t unusual. Maybe she had taken Mia to a park so she could have a route when jogging with the stroller. Only then, Carina noticed the stroller was still in the garage as she parked her car.

_ No big deal. Maybe Maya got called in for a five alarm and rushed the baby over to her mom’s. _

Then Carina realized Maya probably would’ve texted her about that. Part of her felt like she might be missing something, but a bigger part of her feared Maya took the baby and ran off. When she walked into the house, all the toys and such were still there, everything looked normal. Then, Carina realized the baby’s favorite blanket was missing. She ran into the nursery to find it missing from there, too. Mia’s favorite toy was missing, as well.

Carina tried to tell herself there was a reasonable explanation, but when she finished looking for any sign of where they could be she collapsed on the couch and threw her face into her hands as she felt tears start falling from her eyes. After being together for years, Maya just  _ left? _ Maya left her and took their baby.

_ Maya left her. Maya took Mia and left her. _

She hadn’t noticed the sound of the garage or the door opening as her tears consumed her. She only realized someone walking in when she heard something being set down before soft footsteps. Next thing she knew, Maya’s hands were on her thighs as the blonde looked up with concerned eyes.

Maya’s words were echoed, but Carina thought she heard, “Are you okay? What happened? I- Is anyone hurt?” before she knew it, Carina was laughing through her tears which confused Maya even more.

“Babe, what happened?” Maya’s voice came out clearer this time.

“You- You and the baby were gone. You and the baby were gone a-and you didn’t answer my call last night and the baby’s favorite toy and blanket were missing and we were fighting, so I thought you left. It’s not funny, it’s just so pathetic,” Carina’s voice was scratchy through her laughs and tears.

“Carina, I wouldn’t-”

“I trust you, I know that I should’ve told you, but you would’ve said something about ‘trying again’ and how he should meet our passerota. I know that because I thought of what I would say if it was your papa, so then I didn’t tell you,” Carina explained as her tears finally stopped and she rubbed her eyes. 

Maya waited for a second to let Carina calm down and start breathing normally again before she explained where she was, “Mi and I were at my ma’s last night, I told you the other night we would be there for her birthday.” 

“Merda! Where is Mia? I haven't even asked yet! I’m such a mamma terribile!” Carina exclaimed as she tried to sit up and look around, but Maya’s hands on her thighs pushed her back down and stopped her.

“She’s asleep in the car seat. It’s right next to the couch, I put her down when I noticed you crying,” Maya explained before taking a seat next to Carina who nuzzled her head into her wife’s neck.

“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you about my papa.”

“I get it, I wouldn’t have told you about mine either, but no more parent secrets, okay? Pinkie promise?” Maya asked and Carina laughed before giving the blonde her pinkie.

“Why were you so mad if you understand? Also! Why didn’t you call me back last night?”

“I felt like you didn’t trust me. I know you do, but it felt- it still kind of feels like you don’t trust me with stuff about your dad.”

“Okay, but not answering or calling back?”

“My phone died, and my mom has absolutely no apple chargers,” Maya tried, but Carina looked at her with a look that said “Don’t try to bullshit me” causing Maya to blush before continuing, “Okay, and Mia was already asleep and I was a little upset and my mom took my phone away because you called and we were getting drunk and talking about you.”

Carina rolled her eyes before pressing a kiss to the junction where Maya’s neck and shoulder met.

“I’m sorry, I love you,” Carina whispered before kissing the spot again.

“I love you too, my lo-” Maya cut herself off with a moan as her wife started to kiss, suck, and bite all along her neck.

Carina moved to straddle her wife, but she didn’t move her lips from Maya’s neck. She pulled away and threw Maya’s shirt off before moving her lips to finally meet her wife’s.

Maya started to claw at Carina’s shirt right before the baby started to cry.

Both women pulled away in exhausted laughter, Carina slowly got off Maya before grabbing the baby who smiled and reached for Carina, her tears stopping once she saw her mama who grabbed her.

Maya and Carina laid down in their bed, playing with their baby. They were gonna be okay despite their rough patch. They’d be fine.


	9. Gremlins

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “No, I’m good, I’ll give the gremlin a quick bath and then put her to bed. Wanna choose a movie for once she’s down?”   
> “Maya, she is not a gremlin, and do not throw her around!”  
> \-----------------------------------------------  
> A birthday!

Maya grinned to herself as she looked through the book she had made. It was January 28th and she had made a photo album of the first year of Mia’s life. There was still one page left empty for the photos they’d take tomorrow. Maya hadn’t told Carina about the album yet which she was starting to regret a little bit. Maya had decided to do it by hand despite there probably being hundreds of websites to make the book, but she wanted to do it by hand. It felt more meaningful to her.

She realized that her handwriting, unlike Carina’s, wasn’t the best. It was good, legible. Carina’s, however, was a beautiful, flowy cursive. It was like her handwriting was a dance on paper. Every stroke had a purpose, if one stroke was off, Carina had to change the flow for the rest of the word, and it always looked amazing. However, this was not Carina’s handwriting. Maya’s was neat, it stuck to a system. She wrote neat, small, the words and letters close together. She had a system. She couldn’t just flow with it like Carina could.

Her handwriting was good though. It wasn’t like Dean’s chicken scrawl. It was genuinely good handwriting, she just wished Carina’s had been on this instead.

She shrugged off the slight regret and looked through some of the more recent stuff. She saw the pictures from halloween, around 3 months ago, and couldn’t help but chuckle. Their costumes had been decided by the baby’s recent obsession with books (well, eating them) and disney movies. Specifically, Beauty and the Beast. Carina was Belle, the baby was the rose, which left Maya as the beast. Maya had not particularly enjoyed it, but as Carina insisted, “We are doing this only for the pictures, bella. She is too young to go treat or tricking. We take pictures, send them to family, we go on a walk to get the illusion of it. We go home and take the costume off. Done!” Which is what had happened. Maya printed out and put a bunch of images on the halloween page. There were some of just Mia and Carina, just Mia and Maya, and a few of all of them. In one of them, they were both kissing a smiling baby’s head, and it was adorable. Under the images, Maya wrote:

_ My first halloween! Mommy was the beast to Mamma’s beauty and I was their rose! _

The next page had Mia’s first experience with homemade bread. There was a big smile on the baby’s face as she had bread crumbs all over her face and some bread crushed up into her little baby fist. Next to it, Maya had written:

_ I tried Mamma’s bread for the first time. It was delizioso. _

The next image on the same page was Carina and Mia napping on the couch, and then a picture of Maya and Mia napping on the bed. Which Maya captioned:

_ We had many nap times! _

And the page ended with two pictures, one was Mia with Andrew and one was the baby with Maya’s mom. Which Maya captioned:

_ And I had many sleepovers with zio Andrea and nana so that my mamme could have some alone time. _

Maya had to admit, most of the Italian was google translated. She couldn’t speak the language, but she knew her wife wanted, and rightfully so, their daughter to speak it as well as English, so she was trying to throw in bits and pieces every now and then.

The next two pages were pictures of Mia from when she was 10 months. Then 11 months, when she took her first steps, stopped drinking dairy, and started sleeping through the night again. Then, Maya realized she had nothing more to add. She was just waiting for her wife and baby to come home from the hospital. Despite their best efforts, the baby had to spend the whole day there today because Maya had to work an extra 9ish hours to help cover for someone who had a family emergency. When she was on her way home, she called Carina to ask if she should grab Mia. There was only a half hour left in Carina’s shift, so the Italian didn’t see the point. As soon as Maya arrived home, Carina informed her she was being pulled into an emergency c-section. By the time Maya would get to the hospital, however, she would almost be done, so Mia could stay in daycare for a little while longer. That gave Maya an extra hour and a half to finish her birthday gift for Mia. Technically they had a shared gift they were giving her. And this one was more for Carina.

Andy and Sullivan made their sons, Lucas and Pruitt, photo albums every birthday. Granted, there had only been two so far, but it was besides the point. Maya was teasing Andy about it over facetime and made the offhand comment to Carina about how they “definitely weren’t photo album parents.” That’s when Maya learned that Carina had never had a photo album made for her growing up. Vic and Andy had made them two for their wedding present. One for the duration of their relationship and one for the wedding itself, so Carina understood photo albums. Her father had just never made her any.

Maya had gotten photo albums for every track season. The stuff in them was usually rude stuff from her dad, but she still got them. Sometimes her mom made some for her and Mason’s year, but if their dad wasn’t happy with what they achieved he threw them out. It was still better than nothing.

At around 8pm, Carina walked into the apartment, her hands full with both Mia’s stuff and her own as she guided the barely walking nearly 1 year old into the house.

“Hey, love, how was work?” Maya asked, as she slipped the book under the couch and walked over to grab Mia who was starting to struggle with the maybe fifteen steps she had just taken.

“Long,” Carina huffed as she put both her bag and Mia’s on the kitchen island.

“Woah- she does not want to seem to want to be held, what’d you do with our bambina?” Maya giggled as the baby tried to get out of her arms and start walking or crawling again.

“She needs a bath before bed, but it’s so late; she should be asleep,” Carina thought aloud as she poured herself a glass of wine, “Would you like some?” She asked as she reached for another glass.

“No, I’m good, I’ll give the gremlin a quick bath and then put her to bed. Wanna choose a movie for once she’s down?” Maya asked as she threw the now giggling baby over her shoulder.

“Maya, she is not a gremlin, and do not throw her around!”

“Look at her, she’s smiling.”

“You can’t even see her!”

“Yeah, but am I wrong?”

“Maya, I swear to-”

“Okay, okay,” Maya relented as she held the baby upright again, “Mama’s no fun,” Maya whispered and she felt a pillow hit her back right before she made it into the bedroom.

Y25 minutes later, Maya had tucked the baby in and was on her way back to the couch when she noticed Carina reading something with tears in her eyes.

“Babe, is everything okay-” Maya started, but she cut herself off when she noticed the photo album in her wife’s hands. 

“You made her an album?” Carina asked as she met Maya’s eyes and sniffled a little.

“Yeah, I meant to surprise you,” Maya mumbled as she broke the eye contact and looked at the floor. She hadn’t expected for, moments later, Carina’s body jumping hers for a hug.

“It’s perfect, bella,” Carina whispered into the blonde’s neck. Maya’s heart felt like it was burst wide open, “you like it?” the insecurity was evident in her voice and Carina chuckled before pulling away from the hug to kiss Maya, “I love it.”

They soon found themselves in bed and before they knew it, it was 7am and they had a baby yelling at them. “Happy Birthday to her,” Maya mumbled when she heard Carina groan due to also having been awoken.

“She’s used to waking up around now,” Carina defended the baby unenthusiastically.

“She’s a gremlin,” Maya replied as she threw the covers off her body to get the baby. They had hired a professional photographer for her photos that they would take tomorrow, Mason, Katherine, and Andrew were gonna stop by for dinner, and then they’d let Mia try some cake. Carina had tried to find the healthiest one, and they were only gonna let her try the tiniest bit but hopefully it was yummy.

The day went by in a flash. Before Carina and Maya knew it, they were watching Mia shove cake against and into her face, barely ever reaching her mouth, but the photos they got made it worth it. That night, after Mia got what seemed like a thousand new toys and clothes, and eventually a bath. They then crawled into bed, Mia between them playing and chewing on her favorite toy, while they talked about the hectic day they had.

“We have had a baby for a whole year,” Maya pointed out before kissing the infant’s head.

“We have. Maybe we should start talking about havinganotherone,” Carina ended up with her face into the pillow and muffling her words.

“Baby, I don’t speak mumble-into-pillows,” Maya joked and Carina glared at her before saying something in Italian to the baby who just smiled at her. “Or Italian,” Maya added.

“Should we discuss having another bambino?” Carina asked more clearly this time and Maya smirked at her before kissing her head softly.

“In the morning,” Maya smiled.

Then, on the 1 year anniversary of their little 3 person family, they went to sleep, all holding onto one another.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Do people read this fic? I feel like it's been kind of slow so far, but I have ideas and plan to move at a quicker pace if people are enjoying it.


	10. First words

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Maya, Mia is fine.”
> 
> “She hasn’t said her first word yet! She’s almost 14 months!”
> 
> or
> 
> A bit of an argument

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one isn’t as Mia heavy, but the next one probably will be. I hope it’s enjoyed!

“Maya, Mia is fine,” Carina whined as she tried to convince her wife. The baby-well toddler, now, was at Maya’s mother’s house, they  _ finally _ had a night to themselves. They were currently out at a nice restaurant. Actually on a date for the first time in what felt like forever.

“She hasn’t said her first word yet! She’s almost 14 months!”

“And at 18 months, if she’s still not speaking it will be a reason for concern. Maya, she understands words, she can process what ‘no’ and ‘mama’ and ‘mommy’ and ‘play’ mean. She has just yet to say any, she’ll be fine,” Carina huffed as she played with the food on her plate.

“Are you sure? I mean it can’t be normal-”

“Maya, she’s fine. We can worry about her first words another day,” Carina scrunched up her face.

“Okay,” The blonde replied hesitantly, part of her wanted to keep talking about it. She was actually concerned, but Carina seemingly didn’t care at all. “Car, I was talking at 10 months, what if something is wrong with her-” Maya started, but she once again got cut off.

“She’s fine, Maya! You’re only concerned because she’s not as much as an overachiever or as good as you were as a baby, but she is fine. There is no reason to be concerned!” Carina snapped and suddenly she felt the whole restaurant’s eyes on her. She turned red before putting her silverware down and walking out to the car.

A few moments later, Maya walked out with Carina’s handbag, she silently handed it to her before unlocking the car and getting into the driver’s seat. Carina sat down next to her and Maya was about to start the car before she changed her mind, looking at the side of Carina’s face since the Italian was looking straight ahead. With a sigh, she asked, “What the Hell was that about?”

“Nothing,” Carina mumbled.

“I paid and tipped the waiter extra for the disturbance, in case you were worried,” Maya replied to the blatantly obvious attempt to get her to back off. When she didn’t get a response, she continued with, “I don’t care if she develops differently, Carina, it was genuine concern.”

Still no response. Maya sighed, she knew she had accidentally hit a nerve tonight, she just wasn’t sure which one. She decided they could talk about it at home as she finally turned the car on. The car ride home was tense and silent. The idea tonight was to finally have a date night, hopefully that would end with sex, with no baby to interrupt it. That did not appear to be on the agenda anymore.

Once Maya pulled into the driveway, she stopped the car, but didn’t unlock the doors or attempt to get out.

“What happened in there? Why are you shutting me out?” Maya asked, despite the car being in park and off, Maya’s hands were still gripping the steering wheel.

“Nothing!”

“Carina-”

“She doesn’t have to be perfectly on track- you can’t act like your father and pretend something is wrong with kids who aren’t perfect!” Carina snapped and Maya’s breath hitched. Without a response, she unlocked the car and stepped out.

Carina threw her head into her hands once she was finally alone. She hadn’t meant what she’d said, she’d just been frustrated. Her entire child, her dad told her if she was below the average, there was something wrong with her. She had been forced to doctors because she didn’t speak as much as normal, she was fine, just quiet. She was taken to the doctor when she was 13 because she hadn’t made it past 5’2 yet. Her dad thought that it was unnatural when in reality she just had yet to get a growth spurt. Her dad had done stuff like that all the time, she knew Maya was just looking out for Mia, but it had reminded her of her dad and she lashed out.

Carina took a few moments to compose herself before walking into the house where she found Maya drinking a glass of whiskey. The doctor decided to get herself a glass of wine and sit next to her wife.

Another factor that wasn’t helping her mood was the date. It was the day after the anniversary of her mom’s death. She hadn’t remembered the date until late. She had a good day with Maya and Mia, her mom completely slipped her mind. At around 9, when she remembered, she lied and said she’d been paged. She actually bought a quick plane ticket to San Francisco where she bought flowers for her mom before bringing them to the park they used to go to whenever Carina visited. It would always just be her and her mom, Andrea would go to a friend’s. She got the plane ticket for 12:30am. Got into San Francisco at 2:30. Had gotten the flowers and put them in the park, near their favorite bench by 3:45. She’d gotten back to the airport 30 minutes before her 4:30am flight and she made it home by 8am before Maya woke up.

She could’ve told Maya, but she didn’t feel like talking about it. She just went to bed until around noon when Mia forced her up. Thinking about her mom usually made her think about her dad. Maya saying something that seemed like what her dad had said to her made her need to be at home.

“Wanna tell me why we apparently spent $200 on plane tickets last night?” Maya asked as she showed Carina her phone which currently had their savings account pulled up. Carina stayed silent and Maya sighed before running her fingers through her hair, “Carina, I know what yesterday was! We’ve been together for almost 5 years now. You didn’t have to not tell me your plan! We could’ve brought Mia to my mom’s and gone together! Now you’ve been cranky all day because you didn’t sleep because you decided it was more important to keep the fact you were hurting hidden-”

“Like you’ve never done it!” Carina cut the blonde off.

Maya took a deep breath, “I know I’ve done it, but saying I’m like my dad is a low blow!”

“You’re not like you’re dad, okay? Are you happy now?” Carina mumbled and Maya scoffed.

They sat in silence for another few moments before Maya stood up and walked into the bedroom. Before Carina knew it, the blonde had returned in jogging clothes.

“I’m going for a run, text me when you want to talk and I will come back,” Maya mumbled as she made her way to the door.

“Maya, don’t be ridiculous, it’s dark outside.”

“Yeah, but right now I just can’t be in here,” Maya brushed off Carina and headed outside. She had been running for less than an hour when she got a text that said  _ “Come home.” _

It took her around 10 minutes to finish the loop she ran in their neighborhood and get home.

Carina was sat on the couch, her once again full glass of wine in front of her as she swirled her fingers around the rim.

“Are you ready to tal-”

“My dad.”

“Hmuh?” That wasn’t what Maya expected.

“You’re not like your dad. My dad took me to a doctor anytime I did something below average, he was convinced something was wrong with me and for some reason that just- what you were saying something was wrong with Mia that’s what I thought of,” Carina admitted.

“Mia is perfect, no matter what, I don’t want something to be wrong with her,” Maya replied softly.

“I know, I just-”

“I know, our dads both suck.”

Carina nodded with a small, sad chuckle.

“Luckily for Mia, we aren’t like them,” Maya pointed out, she hadn’t realized when it had happened, but they were now crammed into the corner of the couch with Carina’s head burrowed into her neck.

The next morning, after a nightful of sleep for the both of them, they were at Maya’s moms house and as soon as the door opened, Mia squealed happily and ran to Carina who picked the baby up before placing a kiss to the tiny cheek.

“Ma-ma!” Mia sounded excited as she grabbed Carina’s neck and tried to hug the doctor.

“Did she just-” Maya started and Carina laughed at the irony.

“You owe me a massage,” Carina pointed out before happily praising the girl and zerberting the small cheek causing quite a few giggles.

“Of course she had to wait until after our argument to say her first word,” Maya mumbled before going to kiss the baby who was seemingly very proud of herself.

“Well, maybe if you didn’t call her a gremlin she would’ve said mommy first and you could be the one getting a massage.”

“She is a gremlin and this just proves it!”

“Gwemwin!” Mia exclaimed and reached for Maya.

Her first two words were within moments of each other, rendering both of her moms shocked and excited.

“Yeah, Passerota! Gremlin!” Maya giggled and grabbed the baby from Carina’s arms and kissed her before smiling widely at the small creature in her arms.

“I love you,” Carina whispered before kissing Maya’s head and going inside to get the baby’s overnight bag.

Once again, Carina’s mind was nowhere near her mom despite the death date being only 48 hours ago.

She would be okay, she just needed to take a deep breath and count on the people she loved.


	11. Tantrums

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “No!”  
> “Alex Maria!”  
> “Mia! Baby, apologize to your mama."  
> "No!"
> 
> Or
> 
> Mia has a temper tantrum and a check up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Their future kid(s) (I already know how many they will have but shh that's for me to know and you to find out) will come from foster care because I am very familiar with it, my family fosters and I know how the process works so it's something I know enough about to effectively write, I believe.

Things Maya had learned were difficult but amazingly rewarding:

  1. Parenting
  2. Becoming a foster parent
  3. Having an 18 month old while trying to get a foster license



She and Carina had been trying to get their foster license for a little while now, today was Mia’s 18 month check-up which was fun. Kind of weird that their baby was already a year and a half old, but also awesome. Right after the doctor’s appointment, they were gonna have a home study which was the final step before their application got sent to the state where it would be pending for probably a while before they officially got licensed.

The day would be a lot, Maya would get home around 9am, they would get to the doctor hopefully by 10 and  _ maybe _ get home by 11 in time for the home study. Well, that had been the plan, both Maya and Carina would go to the doctor’s appointment. That plan was swiftly changed when Mia got into some paint. To be short, the 18 month old had been walking around while Carina was charting, she had thought she had closed the door last night after she had finished painting one of the final walls, but apparently, she hadn’t. This was realized when Mia returned to the living room saying “Mama! I pway in welwo woom!”

Carina had originally been confused until she saw the yellow paint all over Mia’s face, hands, clothes, and the trail of yellow of tiny footprints behind her.

Carina hadn’t left the paint open, the door was supposed to be closed because they hadn’t baby proofed the room yet, but now here was Mia, covered in paint.

“Mama mia! Alex Maria, cosa hai fatto (what did you do)?” Carina exclaimed as she put her laptop down and went to pick the baby up.

“Pwendi vernice (Get paint)!” Mia replied happily and wrapped her arms around Carina’s neck, effectively getting the yellow paint all over her mom as well. Carina winced at the idea of having to get the paint off of both her and the baby before heading into the bathroom and starting the bath. She hadn’t said anything yet, just turned the water on and went back to look at the damage done, still holding Mia to avoid the little girl making any more of a mess.

“Mama, tu awabbiata (you mad)?” Mia asked quietly after noticing Carina who quietly looked at the damage.

“Uh, no, no, I should’ve been keeping a better eye on you,” Carina told the girl before heading back into the bathroom where the bath seemed to be filled up enough.

This had all happened by 7:30. At 8:50, Carina had finally gotten all of the paint off of Mia (not only did it dry quickly, the toddler got it literally everywhere, plus she hadn’t been very cooperative in the bath because she liked being “welwo!”) and it became an early nap time.

“No nap!” Mia insisted, but Carina, who was still covered in paint from when she was holding Mia, wasn’t having it and put the small child in her room.

During this time, Carina threw her and Mia’s paint filled clothes in the wash and hopped in the shower, luckily the paint was only on her arms and neck, so it didn’t take her too long to get all of the paint off of herself. She was nearly done when she heard a “what the hell happened?” from the bathroom door.

“Mia ‘pway in welwo woom!’” Carina quoted their daughter with fake enthusiasm.

“Yeah, I figured, there’s paint everywhere. Car, the social worker is gonna be here in almost two hours and in 20 minutes we have to take Mia to her appointment, there’s no way we can clean it all up, and the yellow room is the room where foster children will play and with its current state there’s no way we’ll get licensed and-”

Carina stepped out of the shower and grabbed a towel as she cut her wife off, “Perfect, I cannot look at our daughter right now, because I spend nearly an hour and a half giving her a bath to get paint off of her, so I will clean up and you can take her to the doctor,” Carina suggested.

“You can’t look at our daughter?” Maya chuckled in disbelief. Carina rolled her eyes and stepped closer to kiss Maya quickly, “It is, uh, what is the phrase? It was iperbole, of course I can look at her, I’m just a bit frustrated.”

“I will take her to the doctor,” Maya agreed before getting on her tiptoes and kissing Carina’s head.

“By the way, baby, there’s paint on your nose,” Maya whispered before turning around to go grab Mia and get her ready, “Oh, yeah, by the way, Mia is none too pleased with you because she didn’t want to nap.”

“When did she tell you that?” Carina asked and without turning around Maya said, “She didn’t she was yelling from her crib ‘No nap! No nap!’ and I figured I’d come ask you what that was about.”

Carina sighed, so she had her 18 month old yelling about not napping. That was always fun. When Carina was dressed, she saw Mia sitting down playing with her favorite toy, a little plush dinosaur that she was almost always hanging onto, as Maya packed the diaper bag.

“I’m gonna go get started cleaning up, I love you,” Carina pressed a soft, quick kiss to Maya’s lips before going to say goodbye to MIa. She crouched down and said, “Bye, piccola, I love you,” and she went to press a kiss on the toddler’s head only for her to move away with a huff. This caused Carina to scoff, annoyed, “Mia, don’t be rude.”

“No!” The tiny brunette crossed her arms and glared angrily.

“Alex Maria!” Carina scolded and the tiny human just stuck her tongue out at her mom.

“Mia!” Maya cut in and went to grab her from where she was sitting. “Baby, apologize to your mama,” Maya urged, but the toddler, once again, said, “No!”

“Okay, you are in time out until Mammy is ready to go to the doctor,” The Italian said and she started to grab Mia from Maya when the toddler screamed, “NO!”

Carina was growing obviously frustrated and Maya had realized the biggest problem in their parenting, they didn’t know how to deal with tantrums or misbehaviors in a healthy way, Maya was always forced to go run and Carina was screamed at or spanked.

“Car, you go deal with the paint, I will deal with Mia, you will get an apology by the time we get back,” Maya promised and kissed Carina softly before taking Mia to the car.

* * *

Carina was lucky the paint would be difficult to clean because surprisingly, it really helped with her frustration.

During the beginning of the car ride, Mia tried to talk to Maya, but only to be met by silence, she eventually tried yelling which was also met by silence. Maya didn’t necessarily want to just ignore her daughter, but she was unclear of how to handle this. She had promised Carina an apology though, so she would figure it out. While they were waiting for the doctor, Mia was sitting on Maya’s lap and playing with the band on her mother’s left ring finger.

“You were very rude today,” Maya started cautiously, unaware of both what to do next and how Mia would react.

“Mama mean!” Mia whined and Maya sighed before placing a kiss on the brown hair.

“Mama was frustrated, it doesn’t mean she doesn’t love you,” Maya tried to explain but the 18 month old just shrugged and played with her dinosaur more.

“Alex Bishop-DeLuca?” The nurse called and Maya picked Mia and the diaper bag up and they went back.

After getting weighed and her height and head measured, the doctor came back and started talking to Maya.

“She looks on track, her height is in the 58th percentile she’s perfectly normal there, head circumference is in the 54th, and weight is in the 41st which is a little lower than I’d like for her size, but no need to try to rush it up, she’s healthy,” the pediatrician explained with a smile.

“Okay, how many words is she saying at this point, at least 10 right?” The doctor asked and Maya nodded, “She’s well-spoken, started late and now won’t stop.”

“Okay, Mia, so can you say something for me?” The doctor asked and Mia raised one of her very little eyebrows, something she’d started doing a few weeks ago after watching Carina do it a few times.

“Engwish owur Itawian?” Mia asked.

“You speak Italian?”

“Si, anche mamma (so does mama),” Mia said and the doctor nodded.

“I don’t speak Italian, so English preferably,” He smiled nicely.

“Mama speak Itawian, ma Mama mean!” Mia exclaimed and Maya winced because that’s not what you want your kid to tell your doctor.

“Mia! Sorry, she and Carina got into an argument about a nap today,” Maya explained and the doctor chuckled.

“No nap!” Mia whined from her seat.

“So she understands phrases really well too,” The doctor pointed out and Maya nodded.

“Piccola, why don’t you tell Dr. Leary about your favorite toy and color?” Maya asked and Mia smiled excitedly.

“I pway wif Weo! He my dinothaur! He gween, ma my favowite cowor is welwo! Just wike new woom!” Mia exclaimed and she tried to grab the toy from the bag but Maya held it back.

“Can you pick Weo up for me?”

“Not ‘Weo!’ Weo!” Mia corrected and the doctor looked at Maya confused.

“Leo, is his name,” Maya informed and the doctor nodded and asked again.

After making sure Mia was perfectly healthy and on track (which she was), they were paying and getting another appointment when the technician asked, “Can she have a lollipop?”

“Pwease, mommy! Pwease, pwease!” Mia asked and looked up at Maya with her big, blue, pleading eyes. Suddenly, Maya had realized how to make Mia apologize.

“No, thank you, though, she’s been rude today, so no candy, maybe next time, though,” Maya said before grabbing Mia’s hand and starting to walk away, but the toddler tried to keep her feet rooted to the spot.

“Wowwipop! Wowwipop! Gimme wowwipop!” She yelled in the middle of the doctor’s office.

“Hey!” Maya said firmly as she got on one knee and became eye level with the young girl. This got Mia’s attention and she quieted down, but still looked angry.

“You were rude today, and mean to your mama, so being even ruder is not what is gonna get you a lollipop, and if you keep acting like this when we get home you are going in your room until you’re ready to apologize, okay?” Maya told Mia, she hoped firmly with no wavering despite her lack of confidence. She hadn’t been sure if it would work, but Mia swallowed loudly and nodded.

“Good, now when we get home, you’re going to apologize to your mama, okay?” Maya told her and Mia nodded again.

Maya felt other parent’s eyes on her and suddenly got very insecure of whether or not she handled that correctly, but she just grabbed Mia’s hand and they walked out.

She got Mia in the car seat and put the diaper bag back in the car before looking at the toddler with a sad sigh, maybe she had been a little rude.

“Mi, are you hungry? I packed some crackers in case you want a snack,” Maya offered and looked in her mirror to see the toddler just shake her head no and look out the window.

* * *

At 11:01, the social worker got there, but Mia and Maya still weren’t back. Carina gave him the tour and they ended up at the kitchen table as he asked Carina questions about their overall salary every year, pets, family, etc.

“So tell me about Mia, I see she has a lot of toys,” He pointed out and Carina chuckled, “Yeah, she is a sweet girl. She is mostly polite, but she is a toddler so tantrums do occur and I cannot promise she will not be mid tantrum when she gets back.”

“I remember when my kids were toddler aged, that is not always a fun time,” The social worker sympathized and Carina let out a sigh of relief, so at least if Mia threw a fit it wouldn’t cost them their foster license.

“Tantrums aren’t fun, but she is pretty funny when not having them,” Carina smiled and they continued to talk.

Moments later, the door opened and Carina felt a small body crawl into her lap and hug her tightly.

“I sowwy, Mama,” Mia whispered against Carina’s chest and just kept hugging her.

“It’s okay, Bambina,” Carina kissed the toddler’s head and Maya came over with the diaper bag.

“Hi, Maya,” The captain stuck out her hand to introduce herself.

“Josh,” The social worker shook her hand.

“Love, I’m gonna go make Mia lunch, she didn’t want to eat her snack, and she’s probably hungry,” Maya told Carina as she kissed her softly.

“Okay, Mia, can you say hi to Mr. Josh?” Carina asked and the toddler finally stopped hugging Carina to turn around and sit in her lap.

“Hewwo Mr. Josh!” She smiled.

“Mia, your mama was telling me how nice you are earlier, and I can say she wasn’t wrong,” He smiled and Mia grinned widely in response.

* * *

3 months later, they were receiving their first foster placement, a newborn boy named Nicholas.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next chapter will start with 21 month old Mia and the brand new foster placement!


	12. Nico

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “When do we watuwrn him?”
> 
> “Mia, he’s not a toy, he doesn’t get returned."
> 
> “Ma, I’m tiwed of him!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Note that anytime Mia says "Ma" she means "but." But it ma in Italian and I feel like that would just be easier for a wee lil tot like herself.

“I love you,” Carina mumbled against Maya’s lips. Currently, they were in bed, Carina straddling Maya’s hips, the firefighter’s hands on her wife’s hips as they shared soft kisses. Maya didn’t work today, but Carina did and they were spending the little alone time they’d have today quite well if you asked Carina.

“I love you,” Maya replied and slowly pulled Carina’s sleep shirt off, “God, you’re beautiful.”

Carina was working on getting Maya’s shorts off when the door opened, causing Carina to quickly hop off of her wife and search for her shirt.

“Mamme, I had bad dweam,” Mia whispered from their door.

“Hey, baby, wanna join us?” Carina asked once she was wearing a shirt again. She let out a light chuckle when she realized Mia had, once again, crawled out of her crib. It was cute, but possibly dangerous.

“Yes, pwease,” She sniffled and Carina patted the space next to her and the now 22 month old walked over and crawled (more like Carina pulled her) into the bed.

“What happened in your dream, Passerota?” Carina asked as Mia cuddled into her side.

“You and mommy got huwrt,” Mia mumbled and tried to bury herself further against Carina’s body.

“But baby, your mommy and I are fin-” Carina was cut off by wailing from the baby monitor.

“I can go get him,” Maya told Carina and kissed her wife’s and daughter’s heads. Mia huffed angrily at this, “When do we watuwrn him?”

“Mia, he’s not a toy, he doesn’t get returned,” Carina giggled and kissed the tiny blue-eyes kid’s head.

“Ma, I’m tiwed of him!”

“Mia, you’re stuck with him,” Carina smiled sympathetically. She had remembered when Andrew came home, she was a little older than Mia and was super excited until he started taking all the attention and making so much noise.

“Ma, you and mommy wike him more!” Mia whined and Carina sighed sadly.

“Baby, of course we don’t, Nico is a baby though, you’re a big kid, so we need to give him a little more attention. He can’t walk or talk or give himself food,” Carina tried to explain and she played with some of Mia’s hair which Carina had suddenly realized had grown a lot. It was almost at Mia’s shoulders, the nearly 2 year old had grown a lot in the past 22 months and it never seized to amaze Carina.

“Wath Zio Andwea wike Nico?” Mia asked quietly.

“Dio Mio, Andrea- si, he was like Nico, little brothers are difficult,” Carina smiled.

“I wove you,” Mia mumbled and hugged Carina. As soon as the little human hugged her, the alarm telling her she had to get ready for work went off.

“Passerota, can you go help your mommy with Nico? Be our greatest little helper? Maybe tonight when I get home we can watch a movie while Nico is asleep,” Carina offered and Mia nodded excitedly.

“Okay, mama! I’ll be best hewlpur!” Mia exclaimed and went into the other room.

As she was getting changed, Carina heard giggling on the baby monitor.

“Mama thaid that having a wittle brover is a wot of work, but she loves Zio Andwea.”

“Well, your mama is correct, being a big sister is the most important job in the world! With my brother it was really difficult to be a good one, but I think you’ll do much better than I did!” Maya encouraged and Carina smiled as she went to say goodbye.

She looked down at the baby in her wife’s arms. He was around 2 months old at this point, he was adorable, the biggest, squishiest cheeks.

“I gave mommy extwa diapy fowr Nico!” Mia exclaimed when she saw Carina.

“Oh, baby! I’m proud of you!”

“Hey, Car, can I bring Mia by daycare at around 1:30? Nico has a visit with his biological mom.”

“Of course, you will be with him at the visit, si? With the social worker?”

“Yep, don’t worry, I got this. I’m off work today, I will be able to handle the kids,” Maya laughed.

A few hours later, however, she had regretted that laughter. It was around 11 when they were trying to put the Christmas tree up before Carina got home, Mia was trying to help. Keyword; trying. Nico was asleep when Maya decided to quickly get it over with. They had a fake tree because both worked too much to deal with the shedding caused by real trees.

“Mommy, I put top piece?” Mia asked as she tried to pick up the top part of the fake tree.

“I don’t know baby, it’s pretty big,” Maya smiled, trying to let the toddler down easily.

“Pwease!”

“How will you reach it?” Maya exaggerated, trying to sound silly, but Mia just pouted.

“I go on your shouder!” Mia exclaimed, but Maya had to say no which ended up getting her a very angry toddler, to make matters even better, Nico woke up and wasn’t very happy. Maya went to get the baby boy who seemed very eager to play.

“Passerota, Nico is gonna have a bit of tummy time, do you wanna help me make him a bottle?”

“No! I’m hungwy!” Mia exclaimed.

“You can get some lunch after I get him a bottle-”

“I want wunch now!” Mia demanded and Maya sighed sadly.

“I know, baby, but mommy can only do so much at once.”

“Mama gives Nico boddle and me wunch at same time!”

“Mama isn’t here right now, Mia,” Maya said, her voice more firm now. Mia crossed her arms and sat on the couch angrily.

“Alex Maria, you’re a big sister now, sometimes being a big sister means you have to wait.”

“I hate being big sistuh! Nico is stupid! It was bettuh when it was mama, you, and me!” Mia yelled and Nico started to cry at the loud noise.

“Bedroom,” Maya told Mia and the toddler scrunched her nose, but recently she’d had enough tantrums that got her into trouble, she knew exactly what Maya meant.

Maya made a quick bottle and fed him, the entire time she could hear Mia having a fit. She knew the room would be a mess by the time she went to get her daughter, but she just sighed and took a deep breath.

While eating his bottle, Nico fell back asleep and the noise in Mia’s room stopped, making Maya think the toddler had done the same. Maya moved the baby into his room before going to check on Mia who she found curled up on the floor, sucking her thumb and clutching her little dinosaur toy, asleep. Maya chuckled and took a picture which she sent to Carina captioned, “Having a tantrum is so exhausting.” She made sure to get the toys that had been thrown all around the room in the picture. She scooped up Mia who instantly cuddled into Maya’s body and the firefighter contemplated holding Mia while she slept or putting her in the crib. She looked at the mess the toddler had made and decided to put her in the crib so that she could clean it up. She had cleaned up most of it when her phone rang.

“Hi, love,” She answered cheerfully, she didn’t enjoy cleaning their daughter’s room, but she did love talking to Carina.

“Please tell me I hallucinated the crayon on my carpet,” Carina ignored Maya’s greeting.

“I’m… dealing with it. It’s not like she got paint on the hardwood floor again, it’s fine.”

“Maya, are you cleaning her room right now?” Carina asked, her voice laced with disbelief.

“No?” The blonde guessed the right answer and she heard her wife sigh.

“Bella, she is responsible for the mess, she should clean it.”

“She’s also not even 2 yet,” Maya argued and she could sense Carina was shaking her head.

“Okay, but in 10 years when she makes a mess and expects me to clean it up-”

“I will leave the rest of the mess and her and I will clean it up together, okay?” Maya tried, suddenly over the conversation.

“Maya, when you meet with the biological mom, she may be rude. She really thinks that Nico will be going to her instead of remaining in foster care,” Carina warned after a few seconds of silence.

“I know, you tell me that after every visit you go to,” Maya smiled and Carina chuckled.

“I have a patient, but I love you, and text me when you get here with Mia, I will come and say hi to you and the kids.”

“Okay,” Maya started before stating the obvious, “I love you.”

“I love you too, amore,” She heard Carina’s smile and then the dial tone as her wife hung up.

She had just finished packing Nico’s diaper bag when she heard Mia waking up. She walked in and saw Mia trying to climb out of her crib.

“Baby, you’re gonna get hurt.”

“I wanna bed wike you and Mama!” Mia whined as Maya picked her up.

“Passerota, you’re not even potty trained yet.”

“I can be!” Mia pouted and Maya pressed a kiss to the small girl’s head.

She gave Mia some dino nuggets for lunch and the toddler made Mia hide Leo while she ate, saying “Mama, I wove Weo, but he dino too, what if he tink I eat he next! He go else when I eat!” the whole concept made Maya laugh enough she went along with it. God forbid Mia’s favorite toy, a dinosaur, saw her eating dino nuggets.

Once Mia had eaten lunch, Maya quickly changed her diaper, put Nico’s diaper bag in the car along with Mia who insisted on bringing Leo. She then grabbed Nico who somehow didn’t wake up. Unlike Mia, he happened to sleep a lot.

“Mama, Weo thays he not wike being big sistuh too!” Mia said once Maya got Nico in the car.

“Oh, really?”

“Yeah! He thays it wath bettuh wif just me and he.”

“Awh, okay, well, in a few minutes we are gonna be at mama’s work, maybe see what she thinks,” Maya said, looking in her mirror to make eye contact with Mia who nodded excitedly.

When they got into the parking lot of the hospital, Maya sent a quick text to Carina, but, a few moments later, instead of seeing her wife, she saw her brother-in-law walking out to the car.

“Andrew, hey, where’s Carina?” Maya asked as she rolled down her window.

“She is in an emergency c-section, she asked me to grab Mia,” He said with a sigh.

“If only I could check her into the daycare,” Maya sighed and got out of the care to get Mia out.

“Zio Andrea!” She said with a smile and ran to give him a hug.

“Ciao, passerota, come stai?”

“Ok, non mi piace Nico (I don’t like Nico),” Mia sighed and Andrew chuckled before picking her up.

“That’s how your mama used to feel about me,” He smiled and Mia raised an eyebrow.

“You guys good?” Maya asked and Mia looked at Andrew and nodded.

“Can I see the little guy before we go in?” He asked and Maya smiled while nodding and walked over to open the door for Andrew who looked at the sleeping baby and quickly ran a hair through the dark little curls the baby had.

“He is so cute,” Andrew told Maya who nodded silently, getting lost staring at the sleeping baby.

“I’m cutuh!” Mia exclaimed and Andrew and Maya laughed.

“Bye, baby, I love you,” Maya kissed the toddlers head, “If you see Mama before I pick you up later, tell her I say hi, okay?”

“I wove you!” Mia smiled. Maya said goodbye and kissed Mia’s head one more time before heading to the park where she was going to be meeting Elena, Nico’s biological mom.

Maya almost instantly saw Leah, the social worker on Nico’s case and she put the still sleeping baby in the stroller and they walked over.

“Gosh, your wife was not joking when she said Nico sleeps well,” The social worker exclaimed when she saw the baby.

“No, she was not. Is Elena here yet?” Maya asked and Leah went to answer when Nico woke up and started crying.

“Do you want me toooo?” Maya trailed off as she actioned to grabbing NIco, but the social worker shook her head no and grabbed the baby who cooed almost instantly while being held.

“How is Mia adjusting to having a sister?”

“She’s…” Maya paused to try to think of how to describe it, “She’s getting there, slowly.”

“Hi, you’re Maya?” A voice behind her cut off Leah’s chance to respond and Maya turned around.

“I am,” She gave her hand out and it was eagerly shook by the tall woman behind her. She had dark brown eyes that sparkled, her golden brown skin shined in the sun and it was obvious that she was Elena, she had the same eyes and smile as Nico. The same glow as well.

“I’m Elena, Nicholas’ mom,” She said with a small smile before gesturing to the baby in the social worker’s arms.

“I figured, you guys look exactly the same,” Maya pointed out.

“Carina said the exact same thing, I feel it’s weird this is the first visit I’ve seen you at though.”

“Yeah, I work a lot, plus with Mia, my and Carina’s two year old, it’s impossible for us both to get here,” Maya explained. This was the fourth visit they’d had with Elena, one a week, but with work and Mia, it was impossible for both Maya and Carina to ever get there. It was kinda crazy they had already had Nico for a month to Maya, but she didn’t want to mention anything.

“Can I- Can I hold my son?” The young woman asked nervously.

“Of course,” Maya answered, internally panicking, realizing she was in the way.

“I can tell you and your wife love him a lot, I’m so glad he has such a great family to care for him before he comes home,” Elena told Maya, getting lost in the baby as Maya and Carina had done hundreds of times before. The wording didn’t sit right with Maya, but she had remembered what Carina had told her in the morning and just shrugged it off.

“He held his head up for the first time last night,” Maya informed as she fidgeted with her fingers, not really sure what to talk about.

Elena nodded and Maya just kept fidgeting. She noticed a text from Carina and went to open it when Elena pointed out her lock screen.

“Is that Nicholas with your daughter?” She asked and Maya looked down at the picture, it was Nico asleep on Mia’s chest. They were both asleep on Carina who’s head was cut out due to the notification.

“Yeah, it’s from around the first week he was with us,” Maya explained.

“Your daughter is very cute.”

“Pff, when she’s not throwing a tantrum, she is adorable,” Maya agreed before opening and reading Carina’s text.

**_Carina <3 1:53pm_ **

_I went to visit Mia when my surgery was finished and when did I become Mia’s favorite?_

_When I did a bad job multitasking today. She turned on me like a vicious rabbit._

_I don’t mind it :p_

_You weren’t the one she betrayed!!!_

_At least she's cute :)_

_I suppose so_

_Not as cute as you though, love_

_Well, is anyone?_

_Ah! I have to go! I have a patient. Ciao, I love you!_

Maya put her phone down with a grin and turned her attention back to Nico. He smiled at Elena and Maya felt guilt rise in her chest. They were gonna take this baby away from his mom, but he also did feel like their baby. Maya already couldn’t imagine him not being their baby and it had only been a month.

“So, have you guys scheduled your next visit?” Leah asked, cutting into Maya’s thoughts.

“No, uhm, let me check my and my wife’s calendar,” Maya said as she pulled it up on her phone, “A week from today at 4 works for us.”

Maya watched as Elena bit her lip and looked down at Nico, obvious conflict in her face.

“I… I can make it work,” Elena mumbled hesitantly.

“Okay, perfect!” Leah smiled and started to write it down.

“Wait, no, it actually doesn’t work for us, Elena, when works for you next week?” Maya lied and she saw the young woman let out a sigh of relief.

“Oh! Next Thursday at 8am, but if that’s too early-”

“Nope! It works perfectly, I can ask my mom to take Mia and Carina or I will be here!” Maya exclaimed. It honestly worked terribly for them both. Maya would be finishing at hour 23 of a 24 hour shift and Carina would be starting a 16 hour one, but they could make it work.

“Thank you,” the woman smiled kindly at Maya before smiling at Nico who smiled back.

“We call him Nico, by the way. I know with the name Nicholas, you probably intended Nick as a nickname, but Nico sounds more Italian,” Maya said, fidgeting with her fingers.

* * *

Around a half hour later, Elena had left and Leah was about to say goodbye when Maya took a deep breath.

“Leah, are you sure that we are keeping him?” The fire captain asked as Nico played with her wedding band.

“Yep, 99% sure. Elena is not doing everything she’s supposed to.”

“Our daughter thinks she has a baby brother and I don't want her to think she is a big sister and then him to just be gone,” Maya said guiltily. She partly felt as though she was betraying Nico by looking out for Mia more, but she needed to make sure.

“Maya, I promise you, there is no way that Elena is getting this baby back,” Leah reassured her. Maya sighed and nodded, she really hoped she wasn’t being lied to.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope this was good. It's pretty long, but I hope enjoyable!


	13. Merry Christmas!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “We open pwesents after vis?”  
> “Not yet, Mami is still at work."  
> “No fair! Mami thaid the’d be here!”
> 
> OR
> 
> Maya gets called in on Christmas

Carina woke up to a phone ringing and shuffling at 4am. She expected to be awoken early, but not this early. She sat up to see Maya throwing on clothes and pulling her shoulder-length hair into a quick ponytail.

“Go back to sleep,” Maya whispered and kissed Carina’s forehead. The doctor sighed, she knew this routine. Maya had been called into work.

“Bella, it’s Christmas, we promised Mia we would both be here, have Andy or Jack take over,” Carina tried to convince her wife quietly, both Nico and Mia were sleeping in their bed so that they could all wake up and find their Santa gifts together first thing in the morning.

“Baby, I want to, but Battalion Chief is up for grabs again, I can’t miss anything, especially when no one wants to go! Hopefully this 5-alarm only lasts until 9. Record her opening her ‘Santa’ gift for me, I will be back in a few hours and we weren’t even gonna open all the gifts until after breakfast anyways,” Maya argued with a small smile.

“Maya, this is-” Carina stopped with a deep sigh, “Shower before you get back, Mia won’t like waiting for you to get back for presents.”

“I love you, I’ll see you soon!” Maya quickly pressed her lips against her wife’s before Carina found herself falling back asleep.

Carina awoke to a “MAMA! MAMA!”

She slowly opened her eyes to find Mia bouncing up and down excitedly, obviously she’d been up for at least a few minutes.

“What, Passerota?” Carina mumbled into the pillow.

“Thanta came! And He left a lot of pwesents!”

“Oh? Should we go see what he left us?” Carina smiled and Mia nodded with excitement so Carina scooped up the sleeping 3 month old and took the nearly two year old to the kitchen where the Santa cookies they had made the day before were have eaten and the carrots and celery they'd left for the reindeers had been broken up and eaten. The milk they'd left for him had been nearly finished as well. Next to all of that, three nicely wrapped presents were on the counter, all with elegant cursive addressing who the gifts were to.

“Funny how you and Santa wrap and write almost the exact same way,” Maya had teased the night before as she stuck her tongue out.

“Well, Mia would never believe he’s real if he had your scrawly handwriting,” Carina smirked and Maya fake gasped.

Carina was brought back into the present by Mia trying to climb up and grab her gift.

“Bambina, go sit on the couch and I will bring you your gift,” Carina offered and Mia nodded eagerly before pouting.

“Mama, where Mommy?” Mia asked as Carina handed her her gift. Nico then decided to wake up and start crying.

“She had to go into work. Don’t open that present yet! Let me get Nico a bottle and then you can.”

Once Carina and the baby were sitting down next to Mia and the three present were with them on the couch, Mia looked at her present, pouted and looked at Carina sadly.

“Mommy lied!” Mia cried out.

“She couldn’t help it, Passerota, she had to go in.”

“But she thaid- Hmph!” Mia crossed her arms and huffed sadly.

“I know, Bambina, maybe whatever Santa got you will make you feel better, though, you can even record it to send to Mommy,” Carina smiled and Mia nodded eagerly as she took Carina’s phone.

“Hi, mommy! I gonna open my pwesent fwom Thanta now!” Mia put the phone down so that it got her fully in frame as well as some Carina and Nico.

Carina smiled as she watched Mia open the gift. She had asked to “be a doctowr and help peopul, wike mama!” and so,  ~~ Carina and Maya ~~ Santa had gotten her a little doctor set.

‘WOW! THO I CAN BE WIKE MAMA!” She exclaimed when she saw the box with the stethoscope and other toy medical tools.

“You can!” Carina smiled before unwrapping the small gift that said “To Maya and Carina” on it. She knew exactly what it was, she had actually bought it for her and Maya, the blonde not even knowing what it was. In the box were two matching necklaces, nothing fancy, just simple chains with an M&C connected on and two plane tickets for what was gonna be a surprise trip in a few weeks if she didn’t cancel due to Maya’s work.

“Woah!” Carina said with fake enthusiasm as she showed her daughter the matching necklaces, leaving the plane tickets in the box.

“Woah! I get one too?” Mia reached for them and Carina laughed while shaking her head no.

“Not yet, maybe in a few years though, okay?”

Mia nodded and looked at the last unwrapped Santa gift, prompting Carina to speak, “Nico is too small to unwrap it himself, do you wanna do it for him?” Mia’s eyes went wide as she unwrapped the toy. It was a plush elephant, nearly bigger than Mia.

“This his Weo?” Mia asked as she handed it to the baby who squeezed it tightly.

“Oh, maybe,” Carina smiled.

After new diapers, outfits, and being shoved in their highchairs, Carina put a tv show on for the tiny humans as she started to make breakfast. She hated to be that parent, but Mia had been assured a large breakfast and without Maya here, there was no way Carina would be able to make the food without the children being focused on something else.

Once breakfast was made, there was still no sign of Mia and the kids were beyond bored, Carina sent a quick text. She wanted to check the news, but if it was something bad she didn’t want that to be how Mia found out.

“What do you want for breakfast?” Carina asked Mia as she turned off the tv, much to the toddlers chagrin.

“Fwence toast and pan-cake!” Mia informed and Carina nodded as she put it on a plate, cut it up into small pieces and put a small, toddler fork on the plate before handing it to Mia and grabbing her own plate. Carina moved a sleeping Nico into the nearest pack and play before sitting down with the young girl and starting her meal.

“We open pwesents after vis?” Mia asked, crumbs all over her mouth and hands, the fork long forgotten. 

“Not yet, Mami is still at work,” Carina explained to the nearly 2 year old.

“No fair! Mami thaid the’d be here!”

“I know, bambina, scusi,” Carina sighed sadly. She wanted Maya here, too. Last year, they got a few pictures of Mia unwrapping a few presents because it was her first Christmas, but Maya had work that day and neither really cared. Mia didn’t care, she had no idea it wasn’t a normal day. This year, however, she did know and from the minute she knew, she wanted both Maya and Carina to be home. “No wourk!” she had insisted and both Maya and Carina agreed. Yet here they were; Maya-less.

And so Carina spent the day trying to entertain Mia: they went on a walk, “painted” with red and green paints, watched Italian Christmas movies, and Carina read the small girl a few Christmas stories. The whole time, she also had to keep an eye on and pay attention to Nico. 

With the constant, “We open pwesents now?” Over and over again. By 6pm, with still no Maya and a child begging to open presents sent an angry text to her wife. Then called Teddy who told her they were getting victims from the fire still, but Maya was not one of them. Teddy also told her that she had talked to Warren last time he brought a patient and he thought that the fire wouldn’t be put out until 9 or 10pm. Carina had an internal dilemma, Mia would be mad if she had to wait until tomorrow, but she didn’t want Maya to miss this.

Early in the day, Carina switched her plan from a big Christmas dinner her and Maya were gonna make together to dino nuggets for Mia and whatever they had lying around for herself. Nico, of course, would get a bottle. Then, at around 8pm (An hour or two past Mia’s bedtime), Nico was asleep and Carina and Mia were on the couch, the young girl eyeing the Christmas tree not 10 feet away. More specifically, eyeing the presents underneath it.

“Open wifout Mami!” Mia insisted.

“No, Passerota, it’s time for bed.

“But pwesents!”

“We’ll do them tomorrow.”

“Ugh! I hate you and Mami!” Mia exclaimed before getting off the couch and stomping into her room. Carina sighed and followed.

“Bambina, can you try to use the potty please?” Carina asked and Mia shook her head no.

“Now, please.”

“NO!” Mia argued, obviously overtired and upset.

“Now, Mia, or you won’t get to open presents tomorrow either!” Carina said, harsher than she intended. She knew it may have been a little harsh, but how was Mia gonna become potty trained if she never tried.

With a sad huff the toddler listened. A few minutes, a messy toddler toilet, a new diaper, and new pajamas later, Mia reached for Carina to help her in her crib.

“Bambina,” Carina started before she knew what she was gonna say, “Since you were so good, do you want to go open one or two of your presents before bed?” She asked and Mia’s eyes went wide as she nodded excitedly.

“Do you wanna open your gift from Zio Andrea, Nico, or Nonna first?” Carina asked. She wanted Maya to at least be here when Mia opened the gift from them. Instead of a response, Mia pointed to a nicely wrapped present that Maya and Carina had told her was for her a week or two ago.

“Bella mia, that’s from mami and I, can you open it tomorrow?”

“I want open adesso (now)!” The small girl fussed as she crossed her arms.

“Bambina, please, wait for mami.”

“She lie! Why we aspettare(wait)?” Mia asked, her eyes sad and Carina felt a wait grow on her chest. Maya had lied, Mia wasn’t wrong. That didn’t change the fact she really wanted Maya to at least be here for their present.

“If you don’t open it until tomorrow, you can have a cookie before bed,” Carina bribed, usually she would feel bad about it, but she needed Mia to be asleep so she could get herself a much needed few glasses of wine.

“Okay!” The tiny brunette agreed before reaching for the present from Maya’s mom.

“That’s from Nonna,” Carina explained as she helped the tiny human unwrap it. It was a little doll that had the same hair and eyes as Mia.

“Woah!! I fank Nonna?”

“We’ll call in the morning,” Carina reassured and Mia nodded before grabbing her doll, Leo, and waddling to her room. Supposedly forgetting the cookie.

After saying goodnight and reading a bedtime story, Carina poured herself a generous glass of a classic red she’d had for a while. Around two sips in, Nico woke up. 20 minutes later, she had him back to sleep and nearly downed the wine before refilling it. She sat on the couch, swirling her fingers around the top of the glass with the hand she wasn’t using to hold it. She had missed wine. With young kids, she hadn’t had as much time to drink, but it was Christmas and everyone would be fine as long as she wasn’t double-vision drunk.

She stayed on the couch, every so often going to put Nico back to bed when he woke up, until 1 am; when Maya got home. She tried to walk in silently, but gave up in defeat when she noticed the lights on in the living room.

“Hey,” She mumbled quietly as she walked in and went to place a kiss on Carina’s head. She was shocked when the brunette moved her head away.

“Are you hurt?” Carina mumbled quietly, not yet looking at Maya.

“No, I mean I got a little bruised, but I’m fine.”

“Good, your daughter was a pain all day because she didn’t get to open her presents.”

“I can’t control when fires-”

“You can control your reaction! You didn’t have to go in today, you just care more about your job than your family,” Carina snapped before taking a deep breath.

“I don’t care about my job more than you guys!”

“You missed Christmas because you want a promotion! Next year don’t promise Mia you will be here! I can’t control when babies are born, so I made sure someone could fill in for me because we  _ promised _ Mia.”

“This isn’t my fault!” Maya yelled before mumbling a sorry when she realized how loud she was.

Carina shook her head, frustration obvious in her features, “I was gonna make you sleep on the couch, but you still have to shower and everything so I can take it. You’re just- you’re unbelievable.”

Maya scoffed, anger flaring in her features as she rolled her eyes before speeding into the master bedroom.

The next morning, after profusely apologizing to Mia and giving her a cookie for breakfast, Maya had been forgiven by the toddler. Nico didn’t know the day before wasn’t normal. Carina however was still mad, and when Maya’s mom came over to have brunch with them, Maya pulled Carina into their room.

“You have to talk to me, this is ridiculous, Car,” Maya tried and Carina just reached for the door.

“I’m glad you didn’t get hurt yesterday,” The taller woman mumbled before reaching for the door, but the blonde stopped her.

“We have a chance to talk, Carina. While my mom is with the kids, let’s talk.”

“Not only did you leave me alone on Christmas day with two kids under two years old, you also had my worried out of my mind, and with a toddler constantly asking for presents and me constantly having to let her down because her mom wanted a promotion!

“Not to mention the time and money and effort I put into planning our Santa gift, but you don’t care because you want to be the youngest Chief, it’s not fair, Maya!” Carina released what had been going through her mind for the past 24 hours.

“What did Santa get me?”

“It doesn’t matter, I’m gonna- it’s not gonna happen. It would require you doing something you don't want to do so I will cancel it and just give you the stupid necklace,” Carina told her wife as she started feeling tears build up in her eyes. She hated this feeling, she was mad at Maya but she also just needed a hug from the fire captain.

“Carina, I’m sorry, it won’t happen again. You don’t have to cancel whatever plans you made,” Maya tried to convince the doctor who just shook her head no, “Car, c’mon, wh-”

“Plane tickets, I was gonna take you out of town for a weekend in February, it was stupid to even get them, with work and the kids it’s not gonna happen, so it was a waste of money, a stupid resort at Lake Tahoe- it’s stupid!” Carina bursted out quickly, her eyes growing increasingly more watery.

“Baby, that doesn’t sound stupid-”

“Can we just not talk about this? I wanna go eat brunch and watch a bad Christmas movie and whatever.”

“I love you, and I will take the weekend in February off, as well as Mia’s birthday,” Maya promised and placed her forehead against Carina’s. Part of the Italian wanted to pull away, but she just sighed and pushed her forehead against Maya’s.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t realize how much I messed up.”

“You really wanna go?”

“I do, I wanna spend all of my free time with you and Mia and Nico and I’m sorry I haven’t made that obvious. You guys mean the world to me, work is temporary, you guys are my forever, okay?” Maya whispered softly and Carina nodded before kissing Maya’s lips softly.

After eating brunch, they turned on a Christmas movie for Mia while the toddler and baby sat in the living room with Maya’s mom, Mia on the floor playing with her brand new lego duplos from her moms while Carina and Maya disappeared into their room, deciding to do the opposite of talking.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you enjoyed and have a nice day (or night or evening or morning or whatever it is wherever you are)


	14. Unbearable

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I couldn't really find a good quote I wanted to use as the summary for this so,, yeah. Maya and Carina going through a threeish month span of parenthood

Mia’s 2nd birthday had gone without a hitch, she had gotten a new photo album and then they had made it for another 9 month when in September, Nico turned 1. He had been walking (barely) and he had said his first word “Mimi!” after giving Mia a big hug. Today, three days after his birthday, there was a court date. The goal was going to be changed from reuniting him and his mom to termination of parental rights and him being adopted. At least, that’s what Maya and Carina had been told.

The two women had been at the island while the kids were sleeping, Mia had recently switched to a “big girl bed” and loved no longer being confined to the crib. She had been climbing out of the crib for a while so her walking into the kitchen while they were walking wasn’t that strange to them. What was strange to them, however, was while they were whispering and having a conversation about what was going to happen later, they heard Mia scream.

They ran into her room to see Nico, who had obviously learned to climb out of his crib on her floor playing with Leo.

“Bambina, what’s wrong?”

“Weo is mine!” Mia yelled and tried to grab the dinosaur from Leo who held it close to his chest.

“I pway!” He claimed and turned around, away from Mia. The older toddler crossed her arms and huffed angrily.

“You got this?” Maya asked Carina as she gestured to the door.

“Yeah, you go finish making breakfast,” The Italian answered and sat down with the toddlers.

“I want Weo back!” Mia yelled, she was getting so big now, her hair in a messy braid Carina had rushed it in the night before. The hair that was now down to her lower back when it wasn’t up and styled. Nico’s curly hair had also gotten pretty long.

“Bambino, can you give il giocattolo (the toy) back to tua sorella, per favore (your sister, please)?” Carina asked softly and Nico scrunched up his tiny nose.

A thousand different emotions went through the one year old’s face before he finally settled on sadness and handed the toy back to Mia.

“Grazie, Bambino,” Carina kissed his head softly, before looking at Mia expectantly, “Bella, can you say grazie?”

“No!”

“Mia,” Carina warned. She couldn’t deal with a tantrum, not today, not when in about an hour and a half she would be in a courtroom finding out whether or not the plan for Nico would change.

“He stowe Weo! Why I in twouble!?” Mia whined and Carina sighed loudly.

“You’re not yet, but keep talking to me in that tone and I will take Leo away from you and give him to Nico,” Carina threatened and Mia gasped before clinging to the toy as tightly as she could.

“Grazie, Nico,” Mia mumbled.

“Thank you, Bambina. Nico, go see your mami in the kitchen, and ask before you take someone else’s toys, bene?”

“Bene!” He nodded before waddling off to Maya in the other room.

“Can I do your hair before we take you to Nonna’s?” Carina asked and Mia nodded, still clinging onto Leo with her life.

When Nico walked into the kitchen, Maya swiftly picked him up and put him in his highchair with some cheerios before sitting across from him and watching as he shoved the cheerios into his mouth.

“Nico, why’d you take your sister’s toy?” Maya asked and Nico stared at her with wide, brown eyes before shoving a few more cheerios into his mouth.

“Nicholas, why?”

“I wike Weo!”

“Nico, you know that toy doesn’t belong to you,” Maya sighed as she took a sip of her coffee. The one year old shrugged and ate some more of his breakfast.

A few minutes later, Carina and Mia walked out, Mia’s hair in a braided crown and her hand clutching Leo.

“Hey, Passerota, are you ready for breakfast and then going to Nonna’s?” Maya asked as Mia sat down next to her and started eating the already cut up pancakes.

“Why I can’t go wiph you and mama and Nico?” Mia asked Maya between bites and Maya sighed as she watched Carina sit down with a few pancakes of her own and some coffee.

“Because Mama and I have to take Nico to an appointment and Nonna hasn’t spent nearly enough time with you recently,” Maya answered with a small smile and Mia sighed but nodded.

An hour later, after dropping Mia off at Maya’s mom’s, they were on their way to court. Nico had fallen asleep in his car seat and Maya drove as Carina stared out the window.

“Babe, what’s wrong?” Maya asked, her eyes flickering quickly from the road to Carina.

“I just- I hate the fact we may lose him,” Carina whispered quietly before a reassuring hand laid on her thigh and squeezed softly.

“If we do, it’ll be okay. It’ll suck and be painful, but we will be okay. It may take time, but we'll get through it  _ if _ we lose him,” Maya replied, trying to be supportive through her own fear.

“I- We watched him walk for the first time and speak for the first time and- I mean I know the exact date of his first word and his first time crawling and standing up on his own and walking and even when he first rolled over and sat up and lifted his head up fully on his own! It’s not fair!” Carina complained quietly.

“I know, baby, but maybe it’ll be good for him to be with his bio mom. I mean- we would hopefully be able to keep in touch with him.”

Carina just nodded, her eyes still trained out the window.

Before they knew it, they were back in the car getting ready to go home. The goal was still reunification.

“I’m gonna- She promised me- Leah promised me that we’d keep him!” Maya nearly shouted as she slammed her hand against the wheel.

“Mami, what mean?” Nico asked and Carina wiped her eyes.

“Don’t worry, Bambino, we just have to get Mia and head home, bene?”

“Bene.”

When they got home, Carina found herself lying on the couch, Nico asleep on her chest as she rubbed circles on his tiny back. Maya was sitting on the other edge of the couch with a sleeping Mia in her lap, her hair that had been nicely done in the morning was now very loose as Maya picked at and pulled out some of the pins keeping it in place.

She continued playing with Mia’s hair until she heard a sniffle from the other edge of the couch.

“He’s our baby, Maya, we- he’s ours and I don’t- how are we supposed to just lose him?”

“I don’t know, Car… should we tell Mia?” Maya asked before pressing a soft kiss on the small head.

“No… no. It’s not sure yet, if he’s leaving, just the goal is still for him to go to Elena. I think that we should wait. Plus the hurt we’re feeling now- I know Mia loves him even when they fight, I don’t think we should. Not yet at least,” Carina reasoned but Maya sighed quietly.

“Carina, we could be losing him any day at this point, Elena is supposedly doing all of what she’s supposed to do,” Maya reminded her wife.

“He may go back to her next week or next month or next year, Maya and I can’t- I can’t do that. He-”

“He deserves to be with Elena if she can take care of him. She’s his mom. I love him, Carina. I love him so much, but if he has to go back with Elena he will be okay and we will grieve and then we’ll move on and have a new baby.”

“I know- I know, you’re right. It just feels weird, like we’d be replacing him. I mean we talked about naming him Mason Nicholas after your brother and in respect for Elena, and now we can’t even name a baby after your brother ever and-”

“That’s okay, Mason is still alive, even if him and I aren’t close.”

Carina nodded and they stayed in a solemn silence for a while before Maya sighed and stood up, still holding Mia who hadn’t stirred at all, “I’m gonna go put her in her bed before going to sleep, are you okay?”

“I will be,” Carina answered with a deep breath.

She hadn’t expected this. Since the beginning of the placement they’d been told that Nico would be staying with them and so, they let him call them his moms and Mia his sister and only for him to be ripped from their arms. Of course, they’d done what they were supposed to, they taught him how to love and be loved and, even though they got him when he was a month old, they were his 3rd foster home and taught him some sense of permanence.

She logically knew it would be better for him with his biological family but it didn’t change the fact it hurt. It hurt so much.

And so, her and Maya went on as if everything was normal, they had stopped thinking about losing him because, until it happened, he just needed to be loved. 

Which brought them to December 31st 2026. Maya and Carina were having a New Year’s Party (more like a gathering, it was only Maya’s team, Amelia, Andrew, and their family/partners). Nico and Mia were both excited because they got to stay up late as long as they took a nap, plus they’d get to play with other kids.

Pru, now 7, Scout, who was almost 7, Pruitt (Andy and Sullivan’s oldest son), who was 5, Mia, now nearly 3, Lucas (Andy and Sullivan’s youngest son), he was 2, and Nico, 1, were all playing. It got funny watching Scout and Pru play with the littler kids. Right now they were playing family, Pru and Scout were the parents, Pruitt was the big big brother, Mia was the big (and only) sister, Lucas was the big brother and extremely proud of it, and Nico had been forced into the baby roll, much to his chagrin. He did end up crying because of it and Pru and Scout decided to take care of him since they were now his “parents,” but he rubbed his nose aggressively, huffed, crossed his arms, and stomped away to Maya. The other kids shrugged for a moment before continuing to play.

Maya had felt the tiny arms wrap around her legs as she flipped a burger. She was making burgers while Carina and Andrew were inside making supposedly a very Italian pasta as well as lasagna so the picky eaters (all of the little gremlins running around in their backyard) would eat something.

“What’s wrong Bambino?” Maya asked as she put the spatula down on the side of the grill and turned around to look at Nico.

“I no like pway wiph vem!” He insisted.

“Hmmm,” Maya pretended to think, “How about, you ask them if you can play something else… maybe even Hide and Seek  _ outside. _ ”

Nico’s eyes went wide as he nodded eagerly and ran off to whisper the idea to Mia who told everyone else happily.

A few minutes later, Carina came outside and hugged Maya from behind as the blonde was finishing up the burger’s.

“Ciao, amore,” The Italian whispered before pressing a chaste kiss on her wife’s neck.

“Hey, I’m finishing up, are you and Andrew done?” She asked as she finished, put the spatula down again and spun around in her wife’s arms.

“Almost,” Carina paused to examine Maya’s face, “I love you,” She whispered before pressing what was meant to be a quick kiss to Maya’s lips, but the paler woman wrapped her arms around the doctor’s neck and pulled her in closer as she slipped her tongue into her mouth. Suddenly, Maya felt something hit her hand. While she pulled away to see what happened she heard someone, she was pretty sure Dean, yell, “Slow down, Cap, it’s not midnight yet.” She looked at the potato chip on the ground and heard Carina’s soft giggles before laughing a little herself.

“I’m gonna go check on the food,” Carina’s hand moved from Maya’s back to her ass squeezing it softly before moving to walk away with a wink, “until midnight, amore.”

Within 30 minutes, food was served and the adults found themselves enjoying one (or multiple) beers with their meals, except for Amelia and Sullivan who agreed to be sober in case kids were bad (and they didn’t drink anyways, so win-win for everyone else).

Then, they all found their way inside, the tv onto the channel that would have the ball drop as the adults all hung out and talked and the kids played around or took naps (Nico and Lucas had both been exhausted and had passed out). With every kid being occupied, Carina pulled Maya out of the living room and into their bedroom.

“Is everything oka-” Maya started, but was cut off as Carina pressed her lips against Maya’s and pushed the blonde’s body against the door to shut it. Maya could taste the cheap beer on Carina’s lips, as well as the less cheap wine that she had cracked into a little after they came inside. Maya’s brain went blank, she was also not exactly sober… at all. She felt Carina’s hands pulling at her shirt and Maya smirked against her wife’s lips.

“Take it off,” Carina whined when she felt the cocky smirk on Maya’s face and the blonde giggled.

“Only if you take off yours as well,” She insisted and the button-up Carina had been wearing was basically torn off before Maya’s was tugged over her head and they were moving back towards the bed.

“Hey, Carina, Mia asked for-  _ seriously?! _ ” Amelia walked in and they both pulled away, Maya with a flush, Carina looking rather amused.

“What does Mia need?”

“Parents who don’t sneak away at their own party to have sex. Link and I only do that at parties we go to,” Amelia mumbled and Carina rolled her eyes, prompting for Amelia to get on with it, “Oh- right, she asked for cake and I said no because I don’t want to deal with your lactose intolerant child, but now she is pissed and I don’t want to deal with your 3 year old’s hissy fit either, soooo…” Amelia trailed off and Carina nodded before grabbing her shirt and throwing Maya’s to her before heading to deal with Mia.

The toddler was yelling at Andrew in her “Itanglish” (what Maya had dubbed her mix of English and Italian and what Carina had learned when googling was an actual thing people say).

“Bambina, c’mon, we got you special cupcakes no one else is allowed to touch, as long as you behave. Zio Andrea is still gonna think you deserve one if I ask him, right?” Carina asked Mia whose attention changed and eyes went wide.

“Maybe if you apologize he will think so,” Carina continued and Mia mumbled a quiet “Scusa” before getting a cupcake and settling happily on the couch sitting on Vic’s lap.

Then, a few hours later, they woke up Nico and Lucas for the ball drop.

A large amount of loud “Happy New Year!”’s came from all around the apartment and as soon as they finished saying it, Maya found Carina’s lips. A good year it would seem to be.

After everyone left and getting Mia and Nico to sleep, Maya and Carina found themselves cuddled in their bed.

They woke up at 9am which was the latest either one had slept in what felt like forever.

“Let’s keep the kids up later often, they’re both still asleep,” Maya said as she crawled back into bed after checking on them only to notice Carina’s solemn face, “Everything okay, love?”

“Uh, ye- no. The social worker just called, tomorrow Nico’s mom is gonna get to spend the day with him, but he’ll come back to us around 6 for bed. Then the next day she’ll take him again, but overnight this time and she’ll bring him back in the morning. We’ll have him for two days before spending three days with her. Then we get him for another day to pack his stuff before he moves in with her,” She explained shakily and Maya took in the information.

“So that was just a long way of saying that we’re losing him?” Maya’s voice came out breathily as she tried to settle her emotions.

“Yeah. It is. Leah said we have to explain it to him, but I don’t- I don’t know how,” Carina’s voice cracked as a tear found its way out of her eye. Maya wiped the tear away before pressing her head against her wife’s.

“I can call my mom and ask her to take Mia for this so we can focus on him and get him to Elena before having to tell her.”

“I don’t- they don’t tell you how to do this, I don’t want her to be with your mom for a week. It will be hard but we can’t protect her from this, for too long. Only a week more if we make her stay with your mom for way too long,” Carina replied. The blonde nodded in understanding before pressing a soft kiss on Carina’s forehead.

“Okay, so let’s make breakfast and sit them down and tell them.”

Once both had woken up and sat down Maya started hesitantly, “Nico, tomorrow you’re gonna start moving somewhere else.” This earned her a soft smack on the shoulder from Carina telling her it wasn’t the best way to start. At least it was gonna be very, very honest now.

“What vat mean?” He asked with a mouth full of pancakes.

“It means you’re gonna spend some more time with Ms. Elena,” Carina explained.

“My uder mama?”

“Yep, she misses you so much so you guys are gonna start spending a lot more time together!” Carina smiled enthusiastically

“We are have time wifout Nico? Juth Mama, Mami, and me?” Mia asked and Maya nodded which earned a happy smile from Mia before a slight frown, “When Nico gonna come back?”

“He-he’s gonna come back tomorrow night, and then leave and come back a few times. Then he’s gonna stop coming back,” Carina said, her voice cracking during the middle of her last sentence. This time Maya made a groaning noise to say it might not have been the best thing to say. Though she understood it may be the only way for them to understand.

“No! I not want stop being here!” He exclaimed.

“Baby, we know and you say this now, but I think you’re  _ really _ gonna love living with Ms. Elena and we will still talk and you will always be invited over anytime. We all still love you and that will never change,” Maya said and his big eyes seemed full of tears as he listened.

“What if I no wike wiving wiph my uder mama?”

“You will, bambino,” Carina smiled and wiped her eyes. She knew Elena would treat him well and the change would be hard but she knew he would be happy. 

“I didn’t mean it when I thaid you thould weturn him!” Mia exclaimed, “I don’t want him to be weturn!”

A conversation that happened over a year ago that Mia remembered. Carina’s heart stopped in her chest. This was gonna kill Mia as much as it killed them and she hated that, it made her want to take all of Mia’s pain away. She wanted to take the pain Nico and Mia were gonna feel and have to feel it herself.

“Mia, this isn’t about what you said, if it was up to us, we wouldn’t be returning him, but sometimes we have to do things we don’t want to. Including saying goodbye,” Maya said and the almost three year old wiped her light blue eyes before nodding. Nico, however, still wasn’t convinced.

Then, a week later, he was gone. The night he left, they got a call from Elena around 11pm. Nico had been crying for about an hour and screaming about how he wanted Carina and Maya and how she needed them to calm him down.

It was maybe the hardest call of both of their lives. He wasn’t dead, but they had lost their baby and every second of it hurt. It felt like their hearts had been ripped from their chests. It was almost unbearable. Mia, ever the savoir, kept them both grounded and knowing they had to be okay, they had to move on. It was gonna be hard and they knew that, but it was gonna be okay. With time, they’d be okay. They had to be.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi! I'm sorry, this was always the plan from Nico's story, but it's rough...
> 
> Anyways tell me what you want to see next! Next chapter is gonna be Mia's third birthday party, but I don't know what the theme should be so any ideas are welcomed.
> 
> Happy Holidays!!


	15. Not An Update

Hi friends! I hope to update this ASAP but my family and I have all recently tested positive for covid. I need to focus on getting better and making sure my family gets better so the update I'm working on will be delayed. I apologize, but my health is more important than my fic. Have a wonderful day and stay safe!

ALSO my new semester starts today so after I get better there may be a delay so I can catch up on work

Basically this fic (and all my others) will be on hiatus for most of January


	16. 15. Closure

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "This is our last visit, isn't it?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I drew out their floor plan because I have never really thought about it before and sometimes I'm writing and I'm like "sure this works for the floor plan" but I think I'm gonna transfer it to sims and create it there so let me know if you guys wanna see that when it's done.

Maya watched with a smile as Nico and Mia played in the living room. It was Mia’s birthday party, a few of her friends from daycare, Nico, and Andy’s two kids. Elena and Nico had arrived a little early and the kids played as Carina and Maya finished setting up while talking to Elena who seemed nervous.

“Is everything okay with Nico?” Carina asked as she took the newly made pizza out of the oven.

“No- well, yes, but he really misses you guys.”

“We see him every weekend,” Carina said with a strained smile before starting to cut the pizza. Elena nodded, her lips pursed, but didn’t continue.

“We want to thank you, so much, for letting us see him at all,” Maya cut in, it was hard, but he was okay and with his bio mom and seemingly healthy and happy.

“About that…” Elena started slowly, “I think it would be best if you guys saw him less.”

Maya’s eyes went wide and Carina stopped paying attention to what she was doing as she looked up at Elena in shock.

“Why?” Maya asked as she took a deep breath.

“OW- Merda!” Carina yelped and Maya looked down to see her wife’s finger with a clean slice through the middle of it and blood pouring out onto the pizza.

“Uh- can you watch Nico and Mia while I deal with this?” Maya asked and Elena nodded. The blonde pulled her wife into their bathroom and grabbed the first aid kit.

“I’m just gonna clean it, stitch it up, and then order a new pizza,” Maya smiled softly and Carina nodded as she bit her lip to avoid a yelp when Maya started cleaning it.

“Thanks for not cutting the whole tip of your finger off, that would be not as easy to deal with,” Maya tried to joke but her wife just shrugged.

“Alright, all cleaned up and reattached,” Maya tried another soft smile, but Carina’s eyes were so detached from her, from everything, “Baby, it’s okay if you’re upset, we will just have to talk to Elena about it. I’m sure this is just a misunderstanding, okay?” Before Carina had a chance to respond, the doorbell rang.

“Can you order a new pizza while I let people in?” Maya asked and got a light nod from her wife.

Maya rushed to the front door, on her way throwing out the, now bloody, cheese pizza her wife had made for the bunch of 3 year olds they were gonna have, and opened the door to see Andy. The blonde wasn’t sure she had ever been so relieved to see her best friend.

“Come in, come in,” Maya gestured for them to walk in.

“Maya not telling you how to throw your daughter’s birthday party, but having blood on the counter and the floor kinda takes away the whole dinosaur aspect of it and makes it feel more like a haunted house,” Andy joked while nudging her sons outside where Nico, Mia, and Elena were. Maya cursed under her breath before rushing into the kitchen. 

“Sorry, we had a bit of an… incident. I thought I got all of it,” Maya paused in thought, “I brought the bloody rag upstairs, right?”

“Bishop, did you murder someone?”

“What? No! No! Carina- Carina cut herself with the pizza cutter, effectively taking of half of her pointer finger and getting blood everywhere, including all over the cute little dinosaur shaped pizza she made.”

“Uh oh.”

“Yeah, she should be ordering a new one, but she’s pretty shaken up,” Maya sighed sadly. She wanted to talk to Carina about it, but she felt it would have to wait until tonight when Mia was asleep.

“Okay, well, guests should be arriving in 5 minutes with hungry toddlers,” Andy pointed out and Maya groaned at the realization.

“If you clean up this blood while I check on Carina I will babysit for you whenever you need it for the next month,” Maya offered and Andy smirked.

“I would’ve done it if you just asked nicely, but since you offered, yep! You got a deal!”

With that, Maya rushed to her and Carina’s bedroom to see her wife twiddling with her fingers as she sat on the bed.

“Are you okay?” Maya asked as she sat down next to her wife, but the brunette just shook her head no.

“This whole thing sucks,” She mumbled and Maya was ecstatic Carina finally spoke.

“I know, but right now it’s Mia’s birthday party, so we have to put on a smile for her and we’ll talk to Elena about it later,” Maya said and pressed a kiss on soft brunette hair.

“Guests should be arriving soon, Andy is being a lifesaver and helping clean up. Did you order the pizza or do you need me too?”

“I ordered it, they even said they could make it dinosaur shaped,” Carina smiled softly causing the blonde to chuckle before placing a soft kiss on her wife’s lips. 

The two women walked downstairs, hand in hand, right as the doorbell rang with Peyton, a girl from Mia’s daycare at the hospital, and her dad, a doctor Carina worked with.

“How about I show you where Mia is?” Carina offered and the little girl nodded excitedly as the two chased off to the backyard.

“Peyton!” Mia exclaimed when she saw her mom and her friend. The little girl ran over and gave her friend a hug before looking up at her mom.

“Ms. Ewena said you got huwt? You feewul bettuw now?” Mia asked and Carina nodded.

“Si, bambina, I do,” Carina smiled softly, “How about you go introduce Peyton to Pruitt and Lucas? 

With that, Mia nodded, grabbed her friend’s wrist and pulled her towards everyone else. Carina sat down at the stairs on the porch next to Elena.

“Sorry about your finger,” The younger woman offered genuinely.

“Why? Why do you think we have to see him less?”

“He still thinks as you and Maya as his moms and it’s hard for us to bond if he still always talks about you guys.”

“I-I thought we agreed you would try to get him to call us his aunts and-”

“ _ We _ did. Nico doesn’t get it, and he doesn’t want to call you his aunts.”

“Well, it hasn’t even been three weeks yet, he’ll adjust and-”

“Once a month, I wanna change it to once a month,” Elena declared and Carina nodded slowly.

“Okay. If you think it’s what’s best for Nico, then once a month,” Carina agreed before going to check on the kids

Mia’s 3rd birthday had come and gone. Then they saw less and less of Nico. They went from seeing him once a month, to once every other month, to rarely seeing him at all. Mia’s 4th birthday would be on a Saturday, it was currently a week before that. Maya and Carina had been trying to get Elena to have Nico at the party, but they hadn’t gotten a response from the young woman in quite some time.

“Maya, it’s fine, Mia didn’t even ask for him to come, she doesn’t remember him that well anymore,” Carina grabbed her wife’s hand and tried to pull her back into bed. Maya was pacing around their room non-stop and it was annoying Carina as she tried to sleep. They had wanted to surprise their daughter, she didn’t have that many memories of Nico anymore and the ones she had weren’t too strong. She just knew that she cared for the baby she’d seen herself in pictures with.

“No, Carina! It’s not okay! He- We took care of for most of his first year of life and then some! It’s not- Elena agreed she wouldn’t cut us off! Then she did! She took Nico away from us!”

“Maya, we took Nico away from her, I know you miss him, I do too, but he’s her baby- well, toddler now,” Carina tried but Maya shrugged her off and kept pacing.

“Mamma mia, Maya, stop it! Okay, just stop pacing and go to sleep!” Carina insisted impatiently.

“I- I’m not tired. It’s unfair to Mia.”

“Mia doesn’t care! She wants her friends here next week, she barely remembers him. It sucks but she’s little, she doesn’t have vivid memories of him!”

“Why are you just letting this happen?!”

“Because, Maya, we haven’t seen him since August, and haven’t heard from Elena since right after his birthday in September! Just- Just accept he isn’t ours!” Carina defended. Why couldn’t Maya just acknowledge the truth?

“Maybe not, but we are still- we still should be close with him?”

“Elena is his mother. She thinks it’s best he’s not close with us. Just like how we are Mia’s mothers and we think it’s best she’s not close with our dads,” Carina tried after taking a breath.

“Elena is being selfish! We are being good parents!” Maya snapped and Carina flinched lightly before simply shaking her head and walking out of the room.

The next morning, she woke up to Mia talking loudly as she ate some pancakes, Maya was sitting across from her and making over dramatic facial expressions.

“Really?”

“Yeah! And then Peyton gave me hewr cookie! So I got two!” Mia exclaimed as Carina sat up. Noticing her mom finally awake, Mia turned around and nearly screamed, “Yay! Mama! You awre awake! Mami make not as good pancakes!”

“Good morning, Passerotta,” Carina smiled and walked from the couch over to kiss her daughter’s hair.

“Did Mami do your hair this morning too?” Carina questioned, looking at the tight, high ponytail that closely resembled the hairstyle Maya used to always wear when they first met.

“Yeah!” Mia answered before scrunching her nose, “It kind of hurts though.”

“Oh, no! Maybe I can redo it before we go to the hospital,” Carina offered as she walked into the kitchen, where Maya was, to get herself some coffee and the little girl nodded.

“My hairstyle not good enough for you?” Maya joked nervously, getting a small smile for her wife.

“Not everyone can be an amazing hairdresser,” Carina smiled as she poured herself some coffee, feeling a body press up to her own from behind.

“I’m sorry about last night, I was frustrated and-”

“It’s okay, Maya, I was frustrated too. You can’t just yell at me when you don’t agree with what I say. I know you’re mad at Elena and you’re upset about Nico. I would prefer it if you didn’t take it out on me, though.”

“Is that why you slept on the couch last night?”

“Yeah, it is. Maya, I love you so much, but I can’t take being yelled at for something that is hurting me too,” Carina answered.

Maya went to respond when Mia spoke.

“Mama, Mami, is Nico gonna be at my pawty?” She asked with an innocent smile.

“He’s a little busy, so we are trying to see if Ms. Elena will let us help,” Maya answered and Carina pulled away to glare at her.

“I’m not gonna be taken from you too, wight?”

“Of course not, Passerota, I promise you are never leaving us,” Carina promised and the little girl smiled happily at the reassurance despite the newly found frowns on both her parent’s faces.

The next week, they had just sang happy birthday to Mia and a handful of little kids were all climbing on top of Maya as she laughed and told a few watered down stories of a fire she had dealt with recently when the doorbell rang. Carina was a little confused, she had thought everyone had already gotten there, but she opened it and quickly felt a little body wrap around her legs. She looked up to see Elena with a shy smile.

“I felt bad for Mia,” She muttered and Carina nodded, she felt her eyes grow watery as she picked up the little boy hugging her and held on to him tightly.

“This is our last visit, isn’t it?” Carina asked and watched a small nod from Elena. She clinged onto Nico, he had grown so much in the last few months.

“Wanna go see Mia?” She asked after a few moments. Nico nodded and she carried him outside.

“Hey, bambina, I have a sorpresa for you.”

The little brunette looked up and when she noticed, exclaimed, “Nico!”

Carina’s heart burst as she put him down and watched Mia pull him over and introduce him to her friends. The doctor sat down on the grass next to her wife and sighed sadly.

“This is our last visit with him,” She informed her wife whose jaw clenched, but she didn’t say anything so Carina continued, “It sucks, but it’s closure.”

Even though it sucked and it hurt. They got closure, and that was worth it.

**(A/N hey guys, if you could read the end notes that would be greatly** **appreciated)**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys! Sorry this took so long, I was sick and then I had to catch up with a lot of school work. This being said, I had a lot of time to think. I have fallen out of love with a few things recently, writing is one of them. I promise to finish this fic because I already have so much more I know I want to do with it, but upon finishing it, I will stop writing marina fics. I apologize if you requested a fic and I haven't written it yet, but I know there are countless other AMAZING writers in the marina fandom who would do just as good, if not better, than I would. I plan to update this soon, but I can promise any consistence because I have so much school work right now. Have a nice week :)


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